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Looks like everybody is making threads for the individual legions so I figured I may as well hop on the tactics train.
Black Legion changed quite a bit, but at the same time not really. They suffer from mindless copy pasting imho.

Legion rules:
Hatred(everyone) and super hatred(armies of the imperium).
That's actually pretty good. It's like having an apostle in every unit which basically makes every CSM model a mini lord in terms of being able to hit in melee. We still struggle getting into CC but it's a good buff once we do.

Terminators and Chosen are Troops instead of elites.
This is...frustrating? ObSec termies and chosen are cool, but we need a CAD for that which means we loose our decurion bonus and leaves us with only hatred (hah). Considering our Warband doesn't have ObSec, this means that every other legion bar TSons is actually better at this then we are. However, it also means that we make for a rather good allied detachment choice. We are the only legion other than TSons that can use Exalted sorcerers and assorted TSons units in a CAD or allied detachment.
That means that if you want access to divination, you can take a BL allied detachment with a termicide unit. That's better than a CS detachment with balestar imho. Alternatively, it allows BL in a CAD to gain access to divination by taking the exalted sorcerer with none of the baggage (unfortunately also minus access to seer's bane).

Warlord Traits:
These aren't anything to write home about unfortunately. Black Crusader is still limited to marines and Eye of the gods is pretty much built into the warband anyway.
IWND or ID on 6's are pretty good though.

Artefacts:

* because they copied without thought, our weapons don't actually replace any other weapons.

The crucible of lies has almost no reason to exist now that we have access to warpfate or empyric shield for a Tzeentch prince.

The eye of night isn't terribad, but not exactly a must have either. We can get a lot of haywire from psychic powers and this is yet another source if you're trying to avoid vehicles. 75 points for 2 penetrating hits across the board (with ignore cover), no matter the AV isn't really that bad. Bonus points for wall of msu rhinos. You're going to be paying upwards of 140 points in vehicles to do that vs AV14. Of course the vast majority is going to be AV11-12 which is much easier to chew through so YMMV. In a decurion though it might be worth considering. The alternative there is a fist of the gods or a dinobot pack after all

The hand of darkness now has build in hatred thanks to our legion rules, making this less of a gamble. A raptor Talon lord that punches a riptide into oblivion immediately makes his points back. With the speartip you can punch them before they get a chance to bring up their shields, leaving them at the mercy of of a re-rollable 3+ followed by a 2+. There is a different, more intersting use for this too. A flying MC starts the game in gliding mode, which means you can potentially assault them turn 1 and punch them out of existance. So if you plan on bringing a Raptor talon in a decurion, this might actually be pretty nice now.

Last Memory of Yuranthos. Still good, still risky AF. At worst 5 points over an extra mastery level, at best a tactical nuke.

The Skull of Ker'ngar If you really insist on having eternal warrior, you can get it here, otherwise just too expensive. I'd rather tempt my luck with T5 and a different relic. Although a nurgle prince that rolls fleshy abundance could prove to be quite decent.
Especially if you make it your warlord and roll IWND. There is the potential to give him poison(2+) and he's strong enough to get a re-roll out of that and he has hatred. Curse of the leper would be optional at this point,

The Spineshard Blade It's not too bad for the cost, but I can't think of a reason why you would take this over any of the other relics. Dual claws cost the same, don't block a relic slot and do similar damage. A daemon prince is better off with the black mace instead.

Black Legion Speartip:
First turn Deepstriking and fear as well as Crusader. Also NO OBJECTIVE SECURED

Oh boy...We have the most options, except because of copy pasta our detachments don't allow you to switch lords. So the only way to bring abaddon is in the bringers of despair, TAF, or as a lord of the legion. They also didn't give us the ObSec warband AND they forgot to include the tormented formation in the decurion. On top of that, our unique trait of being able to take cult units doesn't actually work in the decurion because they forgot the veterans of the legion auxiliary choice and the new TSons units aren't in our decurion either....*Slow clap* nicely done GW, nicely done...

So what DIDN'T they screw up?
With forge world we can have a 100% deepstriking army that arrives on turn 1. Expensive as you need to buy a claw for half the warband, which then aren't ObSec. It's probably not all that viable but it's a cool concept to be able to null deploy and come in hot.
Raptor Talons are actually really good with the speartip. You can deepstrike turn 1 and assault to tie up a unit of your choice, or units. And unlike loyalists (I think) we still get to shoot up a unit before we do that. If you're super brazen, you could deepstrike behind a transport, melta it and charge the unit inside. We don't have any deepstrike mitigation, but it's still nice. Getting first turn with a hand of darkness could really pay off too. You need to have at least first turn to activate psychic buffs, certain special rules, switch to flying, etc.
This actually also extends to our terminator annihilation force. Not only can they shoot before interceptors, but we also come in T1, potentially before the opponent gets to put up defenses.
The whole detachment just begs you to throw caution to the wind and pray you get one of the most brutal alpha strikes in the game. The speartip pretty much tells you to go full glass cannon or go home.
Between multiple T1 assaults and preferred enemy from a warband, you could even sneak in a helbrute in a dreadclaw to assault a knight T2. To kill the brute it would have to shoot at the claw, meaning it would have to turn around (because you'd deepstrike behind it). That means it's not shooting at the rest of the army and the claw can still jink. Turn 2 you get to assault. Or drop a claw with 5 melta chosen, that get out right away and don't give two feths about it's ion shield. They also have preferred enemy if you managed to kill some other unit with the warband.
Which brings us to the Black legion warband. No Obsec, le sigh. But again, it pushes you towards alphastriking. Preferred enemy and hatred on everybody is pretty strong, even if it's only likely to happen in the shooting phase, but that's were it matters the most anyway.

With crusader your units are actually better at sweeping than slaaneshi marked units since the mark doesn't count for sweeping advances. It also help with the TAF to more or less guarantee a good run after shooting.
Interestingly, all non vehicle units gain fear and crusader, not just units with VotLW. So that includes cultists and chaos spawn. So a unit of spawn + juggerlord can re-roll charges due to fleet and throw 2d6 for runs, picking the highest while also re-rolling the lowest dice because fleet let's you pick. Might be interesting for a Hounds of abaddon juggerlord who can run and charge once per game. Or a slaaneshi prince, with wings they can move 20 inch quite reliably now.

Talking about princes, having built in hatred is really nasty on a prince with AobF or black mace.
And technically we can activate the dimensional key quite reliably on T1, so you could prevent your entire army from scattering. but then the speartip bonus is kind of wasted and you really need a talon + core for this. The talon is fine, but the the only unit in a the core choices that you would want to deepstrike are terminators. The hounds are cheaper but offer nothing worthwhile so that leaves you to look else where for units with a big chuck of your army already invested. It does extend to your CAD though, so it allows you to deepstrike Blood Slaugtherers ( who could potentially assault), contemptors, fire raptors or whatever else your heart desires.

And since we lack fearless, you could add fearless banners and a helbrute in a claw with the auloth legacy to spread fnp to all your assaulting raptors... or not, it's really expensive.

comparing the two core choices for the BL detachment of formations (DoF), the hounds of abaddon was where i was initially looking, slightly less tax. But really is the core a tax in this? I can see great synergies with the deepstriking bonuses BL get and the core detachments rule of getting preferred enemy after deleting a unit.

It almost makes me want to put my raptors in the core instead of in the raptor talon. deepstrike in a few raptor squads with double metla or double plasma, kill something with a different squad, then reroll 1s on those deepstriking raptors. Not sure if that is worth giving up charge from DS though.

Same thinking for Terminators. Either put in core and they participate on the giving and receiving of preferred enemy, or put them in terminator annihilation force to give them a free 2nd shot the turn they come down.

so many choices, not enough points for all of it.


As for the obj sec and fearless, that is the rub with them. I think it was a huge mistake on GWs part. Every list i theorycraft i look at the other legions and think, "but obj secured is so good" not going to stop me from trying BL though.
But like you said, it begs to alpha strike and just wreck your enemy fast enough that those things matter less. Even if it's only works sometimes the joy of dropping in a bunch of termis and raptors turn 1-2 with hatred and preferred enemy sounds too fun.

The area i'm in doesn't exactly look favorably on using forgeworld. So i'm more limited.

 Roknar wrote:

Black Legion Speartip:
First turn Deepstriking and fear as well as Crusader. Also NO OBJECTIVE SECURED

Oh boy...We have the most options, except because of copy pasta our detachments don't allow you to switch lords. So the only way to bring abaddon is in the bringers of despair or as a lord of the legion. They also didn't give us the ObSec warband AND they forgot to include the tormented formation in the decurion. On top of that, our unique trait of being able to take cult units doesn't actually work in the decurion because they forgot the veterans of the legion auxiliary choice and the new TSons units aren't in our decurion either....*Slow clap* nicely done GW, nicely done...

I think all this is on purpose. The name of the Formation is Black Legion Speartip, as in, the tip of the spear. It's not meant to hold objectives, and it's meant to assault hence (the Hounds of Abbaddon) access to Berzerkers in a Core choice.

Arguably, the Hounds of Abaddon CSMs are a better buy than World Eaters CSMs, since they're only 13 points per model, instead of the WE 15 (since WE have to buy the MoK, and the Hounds get it for free). The Hounds don't get the 2d6 move on the front end, but cover a decent amount of ground with Crusader, and can get the Run-Charge. If they want, the Hounds can cover the CC difference between them and WE (Furious Charge) with an Icon (in which case a 10 man squad winds up costing the same as the WE Squad, but then also gets the Re-roll for Charge distance.) Another fun bit is the potential for S6 on the Charge. +1 for Furious, and +1 for an 8+ Charge roll. A Lord with Axe of Blind Fury could be hitting at S 8 AP2. Not to mention the Hatred, which is huge, IMO. So overall our base cost is cheaper, and our CSMs and Berzerkers hit harder than the WE.

Add to this the fact that we're free to upgrade our Obliterators with the all important Mark of Nurgle, which no other Legion except the Death Guard and Word Bearers can do.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Roknar wrote:

Black Legion Speartip:
First turn Deepstriking and fear as well as Crusader. Also NO OBJECTIVE SECURED

Oh boy...We have the most options, except because of copy pasta our detachments don't allow you to switch lords. So the only way to bring abaddon is in the bringers of despair or as a lord of the legion. They also didn't give us the ObSec warband AND they forgot to include the tormented formation in the decurion. On top of that, our unique trait of being able to take cult units doesn't actually work in the decurion because they forgot the veterans of the legion auxiliary choice and the new TSons units aren't in our decurion either....*Slow clap* nicely done GW, nicely done...

I think all this is on purpose. The name of the Formation is Black Legion Speartip, as in, the tip of the spear. It's not meant to hold objectives, and it's meant to assault (hence the Hounds of Abbaddon), access to Berzerkers in a Core choice.

Arguably, the Hounds of Abaddon CSMs are a better buy than World Eaters CSMs, since they're only 13 points per model, instead of the WE 15 (since WE have to buy the MoK, and the Hounds get it for free). The Hounds don't get the 2d6 move on the front end, but cover a decent amount of ground with Crusader, and can get the Run-Charge. If they want, the Hounds can cover the CC difference between them and WE (Furious Charge) with an Icon (in which case a 10 man squad winds up costing the same as the WE Squad, but then also gets the Re-roll for Charge distance.) Another fun bit is the potential for S6 on the Charge. +1 for Furious, and +1 for an 8+ Charge roll. A Lord with Axe of Blind Fury could be hitting at S 8 AP2. Not the mention the Hatred, which is huge, IMO. So overall our base cost is cheaper, and our CSMs and Berzerkers hit harder than the WE.

You give GW too much credit lol. The fact that they straight up forgot a formation and the lack of small corrections like allowing you to switch to abaddon etc, just show that they they spend roughly 5 minutes thinking about BL.
It happens to sort of make sense fluffwise, but I don't for a second believe that was intentional.

About the hounds. I'm torn on the hounds. I want to like them , but then I look at World eaters and our options for assault vehicles and I'm just not feeling it lol.
The hound csm are better than WE once led by a chaos lord, since that way they get fearless and you need to take the lord anyway. They essentially get everything WE have, but for free at the cost of a non guaranteed furious charge.
The zerkers get shafted, but so do WE zerkers. The problem is... how do you get them into assault? Running is risky at best. The world eaters basically move twice pre T1 and that way they might manage a T1 assault.
These guys have to actually stand out in the open for a turn, which is a concept I don't feel comfortable with. You could give them a dedicated dread claw to all but guarantee a turn 2 assault, but that claw makes them waaaaay more expensive than WE and a non ObSec claw is a hard sell. I suppose you buy them a rhino to block LOS though, considering how cheap these guys are. Then embark the zerkers on their rhino becuase you don't want to spend more than necessary on them lol.
Not sure what to give that lord in terms of gear though. Still, WE csm have ObSec for the small price of paying for their mark. So they're easier to get into assault and have Obsec. That make WE win the comparison imho.

That said this core is very much on the cheap side, containing only three units + lord. It's not a bad formation by any means. I just think the warband suits the detachment better. If you intend to use the whole deepstrike thing that it.
You could take the warband + a spawn and then take a CAD of you're choice. A hound jugger (war)lord that gets IWND is one hell of a beatstick. In that case the eye of gods becomes better as a trait too since you now only get one roll and you REALLY don't want to become a daemon prince. With hatred he hits almost as good as kharn, but potentially with S8 and T5 cavalry rather than footslogging. You won't be able to run and charge mind you, since the formation benefit doesn't actually work with bikes (another copy pasta fail, they should have fixed that). Crusader still works though since the lord can run when the bikes flat out. Make sit a bit easier to keep up.

Are Black Legion allowed to take marks? I cannot remember.

Black Legion not only get to take marks, they are the only legion that gets to take units with built in marks. That's why they get to double dip with Tsons unique units. Word bearers are only allowed to take marks on units that don't already have them.
Arguably that would also allow them to use any future DG units we might be seeing with Mortarion, including Magnus and Mortarion as a lord of war choice. Altough I suppose Magnus and Mortarion are daemons of * units so it doesn't matter.

If only they had made rubrics and scarabs,etc replacement versions like with the catapharactii, that would have given BL a real edge over other legions. They would have been the only legion that can mix and match all these snowflake units in a decurion.

 Roknar wrote:
Black Legion not only get to take marks, they are the only legion that gets to take units with built in marks. That's why they get to double dip with Tsons unique units. Word bearers are only allowed to take marks on units that don't already have them.
Arguably that would also allow them to use any future DG units we might be seeing with Mortarion, including Magnus and Mortarion as a lord of war choice. Altough I suppose Magnus and Mortarion are daemons of * units so it doesn't matter.

If only they had made rubrics and scarabs,etc replacement versions like with the catapharactii, that would have given BL a real edge over other legions. They would have been the only legion that can mix and match all these snowflake units in a decurion.

Black Legion cannot take Magnus or Ahriman, as Abaddon is the only unit with the Unique type they're allowed to take.

Boiling down the comparison of BL hounds vs WE, both end up with mark and can take icon.
WE pays for the mark and essentially get the all of the benefits of the icon without having to actually take the icon. Hounds get the mark free and would pay for the icon instead. Points cost khorne marking 10 marines is the same cost as giving them an icon. Seems a wash there since they'll both end up with:
rage, counterattack, reroll charges, furious charge for 20 points on a 10 man CSM squad. (granted the points costs might not be so equal on other units)

So if i'm reading the book correctly the only real difference is, assuming using them in the detachment:

Hounds of Abandon
1 turn of run+charge
+1 str if rolling 8 or more to charge
hatred ere'body
crusader

World Eaters warband
Free move pre turn 1
fearless
adamantium will
OB-sec

Is that correct?

If so it looks like WE get two of the most universally useful special rules, fearless and ob-sec, and the 2d6 probably works out to be further distance than the 1 extra run BL get. Where as BL is "better" in CC once they get there due to hatred, crusader, and a chance at +1str.

 MagicJuggler wrote:

 Roknar wrote:
Black Legion not only get to take marks, they are the only legion that gets to take units with built in marks. That's why they get to double dip with Tsons unique units. Word bearers are only allowed to take marks on units that don't already have them.
Arguably that would also allow them to use any future DG units we might be seeing with Mortarion, including Magnus and Mortarion as a lord of war choice. Altough I suppose Magnus and Mortarion are daemons of * units so it doesn't matter.

If only they had made rubrics and scarabs,etc replacement versions like with the catapharactii, that would have given BL a real edge over other legions. They would have been the only legion that can mix and match all these snowflake units in a decurion.

Black Legion cannot take Magnus or Ahriman, as Abaddon is the only unit with the Unique type they're allowed to take.

Ah right, I keep forgetting that, thanks for correcting me. They do get to take the generic units though.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Danny slag wrote:
Boiling down the comparison of BL hounds vs WE, both end up with mark and can take icon, WE essentially get the all of the benefits of the icon without having to actually take the icon, so free where hounds get the mark free and would pay for the icon instead. seems a wash there since they'll both end up with:
rage, counterattack, reroll charges, furious charge.

So if i'm reading the book correctly the only real difference is, assuming using them in the detachment:

Hounds of Abandon
1 turn of run+charge
+1 str if rolling 8 or more to charge
hatred ere'body
crusader

World Eaters warband
Free move pre turn 1
fearless
adamantium will
OB-sec

Is that correct?

Not quite. The hounds get furious charge without the icon, except it's only a charge of 8+, but they don't re-roll charge without the icon, nor are they fearless. Though you can add fearless with the lord you have to buy anyway in this case. But not having to pay anything is worth not being able to re-roll charges... for that one unit you attach the lord to anyway.

So it's more like:
Hounds of Abandon
rage, counter-attack, furious charge (sorta)
1 turn of run+charge
fearless (mandatory lord)
hatred everybody + extra hatred imperium
crusader
fear ( nobody cares)

World Eaters warband
rage, counter-attack. furious charge.
1 turn of free 2d6 move
fearless
re-roll charge
OB-sec
adamantium will (nobody cares)

It's a flawed comparison, I'll admit. Realistically you're going to get the icon regardless, because potentially getting S6 is still pretty good and you get to re-roll charges in that case. And you'll probably make that lord your warlord, in which case you're almost guaranteed to give him a juggerlord and attach him to some other unit. The run and charge thing isn't likely to matter much, even with crusader.

In that case the hounds are only slightly cheaper since the icon gets cheaper the more bodies you add, but it's not much.
So the differences are really fearless and ObSec, vs (super)Hatred and potentially S6. Crusader matters but only for sweeping so it's not that important for the comparison imho.

So for the same cost Hounds hit (much) harder but they're easy to break unless you take a blob ( but then they get more expensive) and can't hold an objective. Holding that objective is going to matter more often than doing a little more damage. Unless you're playing for kill points I guess.
That's were Black Legion has a leg up on the other legions since ObSec suddenly doesn't matter any more.

 Roknar wrote:

You give GW too much credit lol. The fact that they straight up forgot a formation and the lack of small corrections like allowing you to switch to abaddon etc, just show that they they spend roughly 5 minutes thinking about BL.
It happens to sort of make sense fluffwise, but I don't for a second believe that was intentional.

Maybe. I can't get too upset over not being able to take Abaddon without his cadre, or the lack of access to either Posessed Formation. I really could see it as being fluffy, with Abaddon preferring more disciplined units to be part of his front line, rather than those who have allowed themselves to become possessed.

 Roknar wrote:

About the hounds. I'm torn on the hounds. I want to like them , but then I look at World eaters and our options for assault vehicles and I'm just not feeling it lol.
The hound csm are better than WE once led by a chaos lord, since that way they get fearless and you need to take the lord anyway. They essentially get everything WE have, but for free at the cost of a non guaranteed furious charge.
The zerkers get shafted, but so do WE zerkers. The problem is... how do you get them into assault? Running is risky at best. The world eaters basically move twice pre T1 and that way they might manage a T1 assault.
These guys have to actually stand out in the open for a turn, which is a concept I don't feel comfortable with. You could give them a dedicated dread claw to all but guarantee a turn 2 assault, but that claw makes them waaaaay more expensive than WE and a non ObSec claw is a hard sell. I suppose you buy them a rhino to block LOS though, considering how cheap these guys are. Then embark the zerkers on their rhino becuase you don't want to spend more than necessary on them lol.
Not sure what to give that lord in terms of gear though. Still, WE csm have ObSec for the small price of paying for their mark. So they're easier to get into assault and have Obsec. That make WE win the comparison imho.

The 2D6 is good but it's not like an automatic 12". If you're not bent on a first turn charge, two turns of Crusader running should get you farther for assaults in the 2nd turn (and then you can charge with the Hounds rule). I've only played one game so far, but I successfully launched 5 assaults in turn two, against Bikes of all things. Since I'll also be taking the Cyclopea Cabal, there's still room to manage the first turn charge if I really want it.

My take on the lack of Obsec is that the other army isn't exactly going to be happy about getting close to you. Granted, this may change as I play the army, and I'll desire Obsec again, but my plan is to make being near my army an unpleasant experience.

The way I see it, the main advantages of the Hounds over WE are A: How cheap they can be, and B: the Hatred (which is awesome). I think the most effective way to run them will be to double down on how cheap they are and take clouds of them. Maybe it'll work, maybe it won't, but it's where I'm starting for sure.

For my first game I ran a Lord with Lightning Claws, and he did some good damage. He lacks AP 2 though, so I'm looking at the Axe of Blind Fury instead. Not sure yet.

 Roknar wrote:

 MagicJuggler wrote:

 Roknar wrote:
Black Legion not only get to take marks, they are the only legion that gets to take units with built in marks. That's why they get to double dip with Tsons unique units. Word bearers are only allowed to take marks on units that don't already have them.
Arguably that would also allow them to use any future DG units we might be seeing with Mortarion, including Magnus and Mortarion as a lord of war choice. Altough I suppose Magnus and Mortarion are daemons of * units so it doesn't matter.

If only they had made rubrics and scarabs,etc replacement versions like with the catapharactii, that would have given BL a real edge over other legions. They would have been the only legion that can mix and match all these snowflake units in a decurion.

Black Legion cannot take Magnus or Ahriman, as Abaddon is the only unit with the Unique type they're allowed to take.

Ah right, I keep forgetting that, thanks for correcting me. They do get to take the generic units though.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Danny slag wrote:
Boiling down the comparison of BL hounds vs WE, both end up with mark and can take icon, WE essentially get the all of the benefits of the icon without having to actually take the icon, so free where hounds get the mark free and would pay for the icon instead. seems a wash there since they'll both end up with:
rage, counterattack, reroll charges, furious charge.

So if i'm reading the book correctly the only real difference is, assuming using them in the detachment:

Hounds of Abandon
1 turn of run+charge
+1 str if rolling 8 or more to charge
hatred ere'body
crusader

World Eaters warband
Free move pre turn 1
fearless
adamantium will
OB-sec

Is that correct?

Not quite. The hounds get furious charge without the icon, except it's only a charge of 8+, but they don't re-roll charge without the icon, nor are they fearless. Though you can add fearless with the lord you have to buy anyway in this case. But not having to pay anything is worth not being able to re-roll charges... for that one unit you attach the lord to anyway.

So it's more like:
Hounds of Abandon
rage, counter-attack, furious charge (sorta)
1 turn of run+charge
fearless (mandatory lord)
hatred everybody + extra hatred imperium
crusader
fear ( nobody cares)

World Eaters warband
rage, counter-attack. furious charge.
1 turn of free 2d6 move
fearless
re-roll charge
OB-sec
adamantium will (nobody cares)

It's a flawed comparison, I'll admit. Realistically you're going to get the icon regardless, because potentially getting S6 is still pretty good and you get to re-roll charges in that case. And you'll probably make that lord your warlord, in which case you're almost guaranteed to give him a juggerlord and attach him to some other unit. The run and charge thing isn't likely to matter much, even with crusader.

In that case the hounds are only slightly cheaper since the icon gets cheaper the more bodies you add, but it's not much.
So the differences are really fearless and ObSec, vs (super)Hatred and potentially S6. Crusader matters but only for sweeping so it's not that important for the comparison imho.

So for the same cost Hounds hit (much) harder but they're easy to break unless you take a blob ( but then they get more expensive) and can't hold an objective. Holding that objective is going to matter more often than doing a little more damage. Unless you're playing for kill points I guess.
That's were Black Legion has a leg up on the other legions since ObSec suddenly doesn't matter any more.

ah yeah I was doing my breakdown with the assumption that units in the hounds would be buying the icon since they save on the mark which the world eaters have to pay for.
Thank you for combing over that and double checking me. The way the rules were written it was kind of confusing, since WE get all the benefits of the icon, just spread across the detachment bonus and the legion bonus. Had to get it straight in my head.
It really does seem to come down to fearless and ObSec (i'd also include the 2d6 move in there) vs Hatred and possible S6. The BL side of that equation sounds more 'fun' but fearless without needing an expensive character in every unit, and obSec are just so damn good.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Spoiler:

 Roknar wrote:

You give GW too much credit lol. The fact that they straight up forgot a formation and the lack of small corrections like allowing you to switch to abaddon etc, just show that they they spend roughly 5 minutes thinking about BL.
It happens to sort of make sense fluffwise, but I don't for a second believe that was intentional.

Maybe. I can't get too upset over not being able to take Abaddon without his cadre, or the lack of access to either Posessed Formation. I really could see it as being fluffy, with Abaddon preferring more disciplined units to be part of his front line, rather than those who have allowed themselves to become possessed.

 Roknar wrote:

About the hounds. I'm torn on the hounds. I want to like them , but then I look at World eaters and our options for assault vehicles and I'm just not feeling it lol.
The hound csm are better than WE once led by a chaos lord, since that way they get fearless and you need to take the lord anyway. They essentially get everything WE have, but for free at the cost of a non guaranteed furious charge.
The zerkers get shafted, but so do WE zerkers. The problem is... how do you get them into assault? Running is risky at best. The world eaters basically move twice pre T1 and that way they might manage a T1 assault.
These guys have to actually stand out in the open for a turn, which is a concept I don't feel comfortable with. You could give them a dedicated dread claw to all but guarantee a turn 2 assault, but that claw makes them waaaaay more expensive than WE and a non ObSec claw is a hard sell. I suppose you buy them a rhino to block LOS though, considering how cheap these guys are. Then embark the zerkers on their rhino becuase you don't want to spend more than necessary on them lol.
Not sure what to give that lord in terms of gear though. Still, WE csm have ObSec for the small price of paying for their mark. So they're easier to get into assault and have Obsec. That make WE win the comparison imho.

The 2D6 is good but it's not like an automatic 12". If you're not bent on a first turn charge, two turns of Crusader running should get you farther for assaults in the 2nd turn (and then you can charge with the Hounds rule). I've only played one game so far, but I successfully launched 5 assaults in turn two, against Bikes of all things. Since I'll also be taking the Cyclopea Cabal, there's still room to manage the first turn charge if I really want it.

My take on the lack of Obsec is that the other army isn't exactly going to be happy about getting close to you. Granted, this may change as I play the army, and I'll desire Obsec again, but my plan is to make being near my army an unpleasant experience.

The way I see it, the main advantages of the Hounds over WE are A: How cheap they can be, and B: the Hatred (which is awesome). I think the most effective way to run them will be to double down on how cheap they are and take clouds of them. Maybe it'll work, maybe it won't, but it's where I'm starting for sure.

For my first game I ran a Lord with Lightning Claws, and he did some good damage. He lacks AP 2 though, so I'm looking at the Axe of Blind Fury instead. Not sure yet.

Cheap is a relative term though. A 10-man unit without icon is 20 points cheaper than a WE unit. That's almost a rhino, or an icon of wrath. The icon can give them S6, which is enough to hurt even a wraith knight. Not bad for a lowly csm unit. But you're not saving so much as to afford more units because of the savings, least not until you bring like 7 units.
That wouldn't be sensible though, as you can only fit 3 units into one detachment until you need to bring more zerkers, lords etc.

Instead you could bring blobs of 20, that is the BL thing after all. With 60 hound csm (three blobs) you'd have saved 120 points. Sure would make for a cool looking army. It's "only" 810 points of marines, so you'd still have plenty space left in a 1850 list. Might be worthwhile to hide a sorc in there for shrouding and mental fortitude. It would be easy to give two units a 5+ cover save in the open, 4+ if you can get night fighting. 120 points could get them their personal sorcerer buffbot.

Also, with that many models, you could even spend the saved points on bolters and icons. Bolters would help them to hold objectives since they stop being sitting ducks if you need to sit on an objective. Basically turning them into mini chosen. It would be more of a fun choice than anything though. You'd rarely get the opportunity to use them.

Interestingly, if you add a CAD with termicides you end up with a normal CAD. Generic troops and elites, except that their roles are reversed.
The csm here act more like elites and it's the terminators that have objective secured, deepstriking right onto the objectives. Alternatively you could mirror WE and add a raptor talon.
WE has a maelstrom of gore assaulting turn 1 and the rest follows, BL would have raptors assault turn 1 and the rest follows. Either way you have a fast aggressive list.

What would be better considering their legion rules : formations or CAD ? I mean, they do get chosen and termies as troops, which can be extremely specialised units cc and ranged units.

Just brain storming but wouldnt warp talons be ok for getting a less scatter deeptrike with some daemon buddies with icons? Means you can get your dimension key buff up easier.

 Roknar wrote:

ObSec termies and chosen are cool, but we need a CAD for that which means we loose our decurion bonus and leaves us with only hatred

Let the formations burn!

Well, from the competitive standpoint they definitely got better cause sorconclave is a black legion formation => gets all the benefits of free votlw and hatred.

Basic concept for a speartp list.

Idea is to get abaddon and a bunch of termies right up close T1 for a T2 overwhelm. Not a whole lot of points available for upgrades

+++ Speartip [Black Legion]

The Hounds of Abaddon
Chaos Lord [Power Armour]
Chaos Space Marines (dreadclaw)
Khorne Berzerkers (rhino)
Raptors

Cyclopia Cabal

Terminator Annihilation Force
Abaddon the Despoiler
Lots of chaos terminators (MoT)
Chaos Terminators
Chaos Terminators

++ Combined Arms Detachment) [Thousand Sons]

Sorcerer Disc of Tzeetch, Mark of Tzeentch, Astral Grimoire
2x tzeentch cultists

I've tried to build a nice 1500 points Speartip. This is what I've come up with:

Hounds of Abaddon
95 Lord, Jump pack, Power Maul
110 5 Khorne Berzekers, Champion: Meltabombs
85 5 CSM, Meltagun
95 3 Bikers, 2 Meltagun

Chosen of Abaddon
145 Sorcerer, ML2, Last Memory, Jump Pack, Spell Familiar
110 3 Terminators, 3 Combi-Melta (1st turn DS)
125 Sorcerer, ML3, Jump Pack
110 3 Terminators, 3 Combi-Plasma (1st turn DS)

Cult of Destruction
110 Warpsmith (with Berzekers or Spawn)
228 3 Obliterators, Mark of Nurgle (1st turn DS with Lord)
55 Mutilator (1st turn DS)
55 Mutilator (1st turn DS)

Spawn
180 5 Spawn, Mark of Nurgle

1498 points, 6 ML, 5 possible 1st turn DS-units with Spawn and Bikers supporting. Possible 1st turn Last Memory.

Actually looking over the legion a bit more, they are now the equivalent of traitor angry marines, and quite fluffy.

Our terminators are slightly better then everybody else's (bringers of despair at WS/BS5)
Our possesseed are slightly better then everybody else's(tormented at WS/I5)
We have the most elite troops( chosen and termies being fully customizable as opposed to the more focused cults)
Everybody is is a superior fighter (in that they all re-roll to hit in CC)
Everybody re-roll to hit (warband with preferred enemy consisting of a wide variety of power armour.)
We deepstrike before everybody else (speartip)
We run faster than everybody else(crusader)
We have the most flexible army(by virtue of having access to all marks and marked units)
We have the only generic lvl 4 psyker(WB can get one too but it's random)

None of that really means anything in a game, but I though it was worth mentioning.

And on a note for hounds, I wonder if there is merit to brining a footslogging lord with them. Terminator armour optional.
Champions and lords in this detachment can have S10 power/chainfists. A Termie lord with a (hidden) chainfist has a whopping 6 strength 10 armourbane attacks on the charge.
That's 2 more points for LC/CF compared to Gorefather from WE's. It doesn't ID on a 6 but in return you have S10 rather than S9 so you always ID units up to T5 rather than T4, which is better in the long run. Plus you have the option of going at initiative.
It also doesn't take up a relic slot and can be taken by any unit champion,albeit only LC/PF in that case. That's still 5 S10 attacks or 5 S6 Ap3, shred... Suddenly forced challenges don't look so bad anymore
Now if only zerkers could have powerfists instead of plasmapistols.

Posting my Post here again, as i think it fits better =).

So i tried to make a decent list with my available models^^.

BL CAD
DP of nurgle with wings, armour and mace
3x3 termis ( i only have 3 meltas and 2 flamers).
Low
Renegade knigth with battlecanon and reaper sword
IW CAD
DP of tzeentch with wings and fleshmetal armour
6x1 oblits

Dont know how many points this list is, maybe something around 1600 points?

Thought about adding the omniscient oracles or helldrakes.

What would you add to this list, sticking to the theme (want to keep my dps + at least 2x3 termis and my oblits)? Want to make it somehow decent, to play some tournaments and don' t get instant wiped=).

Hope this can be good and you guys can help me a bit^^.

I am going to be controversial: the Traitor Legions book does not solve all problems for Chaos Space Marines and is actually pretty bad. People are gushing over this book like it is the best thing since sliced bread, but it is pretty much terrible recycled stuff that is only good for Deathguard. Only 1 page per legion for fluff is super bad and there is no fluff update to progress the story. The Traitor’s Hate book was a better read with an actual story and a better decurion.

The Speartip formation is only for bad first turn alpha striking armies that want to lose actual games. Imperial armies do this better with Skyhammer Annihilation and Drop pods. Fear is bad, crusader is bad, and only getting your units on turn one on a 3+ instead of automatically is bad with no scatter mitigation and then having to make a disordered charge with Raptor Talon. Raptors really aren’t very good in the assault anyway. It is just bad. No ob sec is terrible. CAD is better. Just read the rules for Skyhammer Annihilation and their relentless grav cannons and compare it to this turd and weep.

I think Hounds of Abaddon is terrible. Starting MEQs on foot and trying to charge anything does not work in 40k. Tau kill 1450 points of new World Eaters in one round of shooting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTiZR7juqnc

And that is with a 2D6 free move and first turn assault!

…

The only “competitive” way to run Chaos Space Marines is still the Black Legion Cyclopia Cabal or some kind of flying Circus, which has been heavily nerfed compared to 6th ed. Even summon spam isn’t that good. Traitors Legion book doesn’t change anything really and is overrated. So we have that going for us but that kind of list have only like 5 sorcerers and the rest Daemons and is utterly reliant on getting first turn to buff up psychic powers.

Normal T4 3+ MEQ marines die like flies since 6th edition really. Heldrakes, Tau, Eldar, and grav just eat them up. They are heavily overpriced. They need to be like 10 points or less in the current meta. Buying marks on them is a waste of points except for Death Guard where it increases durability potentially. Fearless or morale issues rarely come into play when units are just removed from the table wholesale from shooting. With Ld 10 you have a 91% chance to pass a leadership test against shooting anyway. Against assault you are running MSU anyways so who cares if a marine or two gets swept? That is often a good thing so you can shoot them.

Lets be real. The only reason loyalist run marines is free rhinos to hide in and survive an extra turn. Then they spam grav. Chaos has access to neither and is strictly inferior to grav company marines. For 105 points loyalist get a rhino and a grav cannon. For 110 points we get a marine squad with a rhino with no guns or upgrades. The CSM unit remains a tax and dead weight unit. Deathguard can pay 15 more points on top of this and get T5 and FNP and that is the most “competitive” option out of this crappy book. Loyalist are still better. They get more stuff and firepower.

As for casual games, I think Black Legion is way better off using the Traitor’s Hate Black Crusade detachment. You get the normal Chaos Warband and then you get to actually use its benefit of having two boon rolls a turn. There is actual synergy unlike the Traitor Legions book. A lot on the boon table is quite good. You have a 1/18 chance per roll to get a Daemon Prince or you can super buff a lord. This Decurion is also better than the one for World Bearers in Traitor Legions book. Legion rules apply to any detachment so they work with Traitor’s Hate. You also get access to all the formations while in the Legions book it is heavily restricted and uses bad Black Legion ones.

CAD is also better with troop terminators. I think CAD is better for Black Legion than other legions. They only get possessed or things that could already be troops as troops. Black Legion can then take chosen, terminators, and cult units as troops. Chaos terminators are quite good deep striking melta or plasma against non-Tau in causal games. Hatred greatly increases their damage in close combat. Heldrakes are still great against almost all troops in the game.

Hatred everything is actually quite useful IF you can get into combat. It is actually a better buff than Mark of Khorne without a reroll. I wouldn’t put marks or icons on units except for a lord to get the Axe of Blind Fury. The most useful by a mile is nurgle, but it is very expensive and you might as well play Death Guard. The other ones are pretty much trash on most units and just bloat the cost of a unit that already dies like flies in 40k anyways.

So to me this Traitor Legions book was a waste of space except for the two paragraphs of rules for my legion, lol. I won’t even be using this book except for that really.

I agree that ds without scatter mitigation is bad but the book overall is great.

Thanks, Roknar for starting this thread. It helps a lot to have all BL related in one place.
I share most of your assessments regarding the amount of work GW has probably put into "our section" in traitor legions.

The recent positive developments at GW obviously haven't reached their rules/game design "department" yet. Its work, especially concerning BL, still matches the parody* of typical british craftmanship: bolting on stuff, covering it up with another layer of carpet etc. instead of going the extra mile and actually fixing it. *no offense to actual british artisans intended.
The laziness is stunning. Lots of missed oportunities.
So instead of having a big leap forward, we have another small step (in a long row: we went from having nothing special (besides abby) at all to IA13, to "our" supplement, then to "Traitors Hate" and now Legion rules). But we can agree that we are still not "there" and Traitor Legions should not be hyped that much.
/rant

From a more constructive perspective, I see three options to play Black Legion with style and fun and semi-competitive, one of which is:
Making the Speartip-Detachment work by deep striking only one Raptor unit (cheap bodies) from the Raptor Talon with the Lord with a dimensional key on the first turn automatically (you "can" make a reserve roll for deep strike reserves on the first turn, you do not have to), in a good position. With charge rerolls from the jump pack and a Fist/Claw-Combo of the Lord, the key should get activated. Try not to kill too much to stay in cc. I added a single Dreadclaw in my list with cc-geared CSM and a second lord with Axe of Blind Fury also coming down turn one to open up a second flank/ divert fire.
Deep strike without scatter and then charge with rerolls with the other two Raptors/Warp-Talons (preferrably talons) is pretty powerful and Plasma- and/or Melta-Termicide from the Black Legion Warband-Formation (pseudo preferred enemy should help with the shooting as well) to make surgical strikes. At 1750 I have included a cheap Purge Renegades Detachment with two units of three Spawn and an Aegis with comms relay to have those Warp Talons and Terminators arrive turn 2 and add to the target saturation.

Orthon wrote:

Spoiler:

I am going to be controversial: the Traitor Legions book does not solve all problems for Chaos Space Marines and is actually pretty bad. People are gushing over this book like it is the best thing since sliced bread, but it is pretty much terrible recycled stuff that is only good for Deathguard. Only 1 page per legion for fluff is super bad and there is no fluff update to progress the story. The Traitor’s Hate book was a better read with an actual story and a better decurion.

The Speartip formation is only for bad first turn alpha striking armies that want to lose actual games. Imperial armies do this better with Skyhammer Annihilation and Drop pods. Fear is bad, crusader is bad, and only getting your units on turn one on a 3+ instead of automatically is bad with no scatter mitigation and then having to make a disordered charge with Raptor Talon. Raptors really aren’t very good in the assault anyway. It is just bad. No ob sec is terrible. CAD is better. Just read the rules for Skyhammer Annihilation and their relentless grav cannons and compare it to this turd and weep.

I think Hounds of Abaddon is terrible. Starting MEQs on foot and trying to charge anything does not work in 40k. Tau kill 1450 points of new World Eaters in one round of shooting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTiZR7juqnc

And that is with a 2D6 free move and first turn assault!

…

The only “competitive” way to run Chaos Space Marines is still the Black Legion Cyclopia Cabal or some kind of flying Circus, which has been heavily nerfed compared to 6th ed. Even summon spam isn’t that good. Traitors Legion book doesn’t change anything really and is overrated. So we have that going for us but that kind of list have only like 5 sorcerers and the rest Daemons and is utterly reliant on getting first turn to buff up psychic powers.

Normal T4 3+ MEQ marines die like flies since 6th edition really. Heldrakes, Tau, Eldar, and grav just eat them up. They are heavily overpriced. They need to be like 10 points or less in the current meta. Buying marks on them is a waste of points except for Death Guard where it increases durability potentially. Fearless or morale issues rarely come into play when units are just removed from the table wholesale from shooting. With Ld 10 you have a 91% chance to pass a leadership test against shooting anyway. Against assault you are running MSU anyways so who cares if a marine or two gets swept? That is often a good thing so you can shoot them.

Lets be real. The only reason loyalist run marines is free rhinos to hide in and survive an extra turn. Then they spam grav. Chaos has access to neither and is strictly inferior to grav company marines. For 105 points loyalist get a rhino and a grav cannon. For 110 points we get a marine squad with a rhino with no guns or upgrades. The CSM unit remains a tax and dead weight unit. Deathguard can pay 15 more points on top of this and get T5 and FNP and that is the most “competitive” option out of this crappy book. Loyalist are still better. They get more stuff and firepower.

As for casual games, I think Black Legion is way better off using the Traitor’s Hate Black Crusade detachment. You get the normal Chaos Warband and then you get to actually use its benefit of having two boon rolls a turn. There is actual synergy unlike the Traitor Legions book. A lot on the boon table is quite good. You have a 1/18 chance per roll to get a Daemon Prince or you can super buff a lord. This Decurion is also better than the one for World Bearers in Traitor Legions book. Legion rules apply to any detachment so they work with Traitor’s Hate. You also get access to all the formations while in the Legions book it is heavily restricted and uses bad Black Legion ones.

CAD is also better with troop terminators. I think CAD is better for Black Legion than other legions. They only get possessed or things that could already be troops as troops. Black Legion can then take chosen, terminators, and cult units as troops. Chaos terminators are quite good deep striking melta or plasma against non-Tau in causal games. Hatred greatly increases their damage in close combat. Heldrakes are still great against almost all troops in the game.

Hatred everything is actually quite useful IF you can get into combat. It is actually a better buff than Mark of Khorne without a reroll. I wouldn’t put marks or icons on units except for a lord to get the Axe of Blind Fury. The most useful by a mile is nurgle, but it is very expensive and you might as well play Death Guard. The other ones are pretty much trash on most units and just bloat the cost of a unit that already dies like flies in 40k anyways.

So to me this Traitor Legions book was a waste of space except for the two paragraphs of rules for my legion, lol. I won’t even be using this book except for that really.

I think you're being overly harsh here. Nobody said Legions solved all of chaos problems, but it's still the best thing to happen to chaos in over 10 years.
It's a genuinely good release. That's not to say it couldn't be better. And there's still quite a bit left to fix, but we're going to have to wait for a new codex/further campaigns for that.

You're also underestimating the hounds of abbaddon. They're much better than WE as far as doing damage is concerned. It even makes warp talons tempting.
Not only do they have higher strength, they also hit better. That battle report was rigged to test WE, aka list tailored to fight WE, so no surprise at the result.

By comparison, a Hounds of abaddon min sized unit of warp talon puts about 7 wounds on a stormsurge on average, with a good chance of killing it outright.
WE can't match that. You don't need to get an entire army to charge first turn either. A few key units is enough. BL can do that more reliably with a Cabal fishing for soulswitch.

So move 12, switch with another 12 inch unit and move both up 6 inch as a result then charge from there. But you also get to fire the stormsurge into it's buddies on the way.
You need psychic support with BL and they don't take objectives as easily, but that support happens to come in a rather good formation and hounds of abaddon all pretty much wound on 2+ and hit 2+ in the case of tau (re-rollable 3+). And there's a good chance you end up with ghost storm too to dump a rhino with dirge caster into the enemy.
And crusader is a pretty decent rule to have in such an aggressive army. Fear may not always work, but when it does, it combines with hatred for a truly monstrous charge. A raptor talon can reduce leadership, which plays into crusader for easy sweeps and you get to assault T1 into some backfield unit. There are at least as many synergies here as there are in Traitor's hate.

Grav and friends don't do a whole lot if they get charged turn 1 and can't overwatch. Sure, all of that requires first turn, but you REALLY don't want to go second vs Black Legion.
Every bonus they get except for fear helps them hit harder in some way or another. They are set up to be more aggressive than WE tbh.
The price is that it all comes without back ups. No scatter mitigation, no seize manipulation, reserves, etc.
Aka you either luck out or you probably loose. That's not very competitive as a whole, but it's fluffy, fun and perfectly viable for normal games.
The competitive parts got better but haven't changed much, but thankfully that's not all that exists.

"The CSM unit remains a tax and dead weight unit", 140/160 points for 40 S5/6 attacks with hatred is hardly dead weight unit. The warband can take chosen instead. with preferred enemy(everything), which is awesome. Again, ghost storm them and ruin somebody's day.