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I have been reading alot of posts about Battleforged armies and am confused more then ever. Did the Chaos Space Marine cause confusion with daemon troops ?

I thought a battleforge army was based on using one keyword or is it Faction Keyword?

So to make a Battalion detachment, using Chaos
HQ - Abaddon (Chaos / Khorne, Nurgle, Slaanesh, Tzeentch, Heretic Astartes, Black Legion
HQ - Daemon Prince (Chaos / Heretic Astartes, Black Legion) Allegiance - Nurgle

Troops - Blood letters (Chaos / Khorne)
Troops - Chaos Cultists (Chaos / Khorne, Heretic Astartes, Black Legion)
Troops - Plaguebearers (Chaos / Nurgle)

I know this is a very odd battalion but confused from reading posts why this wouldnt be right right.

Now Daemon Princes Prince of Chaos would only affect himself, plaguebeaerers (nurgle) and Cultists (black Legion)
Abaddons Lord of Black Legion would affect Daemon Prince & Cultists (Black Legion) as well as his Mark of Chaos Ascendant

nothing would affect the Blood Letters.


For a Vanuard Detachment (chaos)
HQ - Abaddon
Elite - Plague Marines (Black Legion)
Elite - Khorne Berserkers (Renegade Chapter) Move, advance, charge.
Elite - Rubic Marines (Black Legion)

They all would benefit from Abaddons Mark of Chaos Ascendant (Heretic astartes) but khorne berserkers wouldnt be able to benefit from Lord of Black Legion.

Please be nice in explaining to a newbie to 40k

Battleforged just means that everything in the army has to share at least one keyword and also be in a detachment. The Chaos keyword, your battalion, and the vanguard fulfill that.

The demons and marines together aren't a problem for that part. The problem they create is that they disqualify those detachments as being chaos space marine detachments (which makes you lose your equivalent of objective secured) and also that you only get legion traits for a detachment if it is a chaos space marine detachment with everyone from the same legion (which both adding demons and mixing legions is a problem for).

You're close, but note also that if you feature multiple Legions (or Chapters, if you're Loyalist) in a single detachment, you don't get the benefit of any of the Legion Traits/Chapter Tactics - in this case, you would lose the leadership bonus and ability to advance while shooting rapid fire weapons with the Black Legion, and also would lose out on the Renegade Chapter advance-charge ability.

Your detachments are correctly constructed, and you are correct about which auras would affect which models.

As explained on page 240 of the BRB, a Battle-Forged Army is an army where all units are organized into Detachments. There are 12 possible detachments in the book (pages 243-245) which all have the limitation that all units in the detachment must share one Faction Keyword (except the Super-Heavy Auxiliary Detachment, Fortification Network, and Auxiliary Support Detachment).

Now the confusion you may be having centers around specific army detachments and the additional limitations that you must meet to qualify as such a detachment. Each of the published Codexes have included these concepts so that you can have a Space Marine detachment, Grey Knights detachment, or a Chaos Space Marine Detachment that all give additional benefits to some units in a detachment if they meet certain additional restrictions.

Your sample Battalion is legal (all units have Chaos Faction Keyword) and if that is your entire army, will constitute a Battle-Forged Army.

Can each detachment get a Legion trait ?

Battalion Detachment - Abaddon (Black Legion)
Vanguard Detachment - Renegade chapter
Outrider Detachment - Death Guard

or if I want renegade chapter legion trait that means every detachment has to be renegade chapter ? and I can never used Abaddon

You can mix detachments that share different faction keywords (and have different Chapter/Legion/whatever traits) in the same army. To qualify as battle-forged, each detachment has to meet the criteria, that's all - so you could have an army that had an IMPERIUM detachment and a CHAOS detachment.

Only in Matched Play does your whole army have to share at least one faction keyword, but even then that keyword could be CHAOS, allowing you to field a Renegades detachment alongside a Black Legion detachment, for example.

 MightyQue wrote:
Can each detachment get a Legion trait ?

Battalion Detachment - Abaddon (Black Legion)
Vanguard Detachment - Renegade chapter
Outrider Detachment - Death Guard

or if I want renegade chapter legion trait that means every detachment has to be renegade chapter ? and I can never used Abaddon

Yes, such keyword based special rules are always tied into the detachment and not the army as a whole.

Legion traits are detachment specific.

I was reading this and as a new player I have a minor question to add in. Ive been using a army builder app to look at other armies that people post and read into stats and other stuff. Recently I was making a chaos space marine battalion and I noticed they had on elites the beserker, noise, plague, and rubric marine. Can you actually make like a alpha legion army and throw all of those units in cuz for 1cp having 20 chain axe wielding zerkers in ur face turn 1 would be crazy. Do all legions have access to those elites? If I'm not mistaken some legions can make those troop choices. Just want clarification or guidance if I'm wrong

In the rules described in this section we often
refer to ‘Chaos Space Marine units’. This is
shorthand for any unit that has one of the
following Faction keywords: <LEGION> ,
BLACK LEGION , WORD BEARERS , IRON
WARRIORS , ALPHA LEGION , NIGHT
LORDS , WORLD EATERS , EMPEROR’S
CHILDREN , FALLEN or RED CORSAIRS . A
Chaos Space Marine Detachment is therefore
one which only includes units with one of
these keywords.
Page 156, Chaos Codex thingy

I'm tired and might be over looking something, but I do not see anything on the individual Units forbidding them from being in a Space Marine Detachment together.

Added the following morning:
Oh, ALPHA LEGION detachment....

If your army is Battle-forged, all INFANTRY ,
BIKERS and HELBRUTE units in Chaos
Space Marine Detachments gain a Legion
Trait, so long as every unit in that Detachment
is from the same Legion. The Legion Trait
gained depends upon the Legion they are
from, as shown in the table opposite. For
example, all such units in a NIGHT LORDS
Detachment gain the Terror Tactics trait.

If you mix <Legions> in a single Detachment, they will lose some Legion Traits... that is all I can find on a second quick review, now for breakfast.

If you mean, can Space Marines and Chaos Space Marines be in an army together?

In Open Play or Narrative play - yes, though your army would not count as Battle Forged. In Matched Play, I don't believe so, since your army "must" be battle forged (if I read that correctly). Remember the Open/Narrative play options are intended to cover almost any possibility. You're 12 years old and you own a Space Marine dreadnought, four Chaos Space Marine Bikes, and a Tyranid Hive Tyrant? Cool, put them together and play a game.

I think GW missed a chance here to simply put units into Factions and Subfactions --- this could have cured a lot of ailments stemming around the vagueness of this kind of rule.

Midnightmullen wrote:
I was reading this and as a new player I have a minor question to add in. Ive been using a army builder app to look at other armies that people post and read into stats and other stuff. Recently I was making a chaos space marine battalion and I noticed they had on elites the beserker, noise, plague, and rubric marine. Can you actually make like a alpha legion army and throw all of those units in cuz for 1cp having 20 chain axe wielding zerkers in ur face turn 1 would be crazy. Do all legions have access to those elites? If I'm not mistaken some legions can make those troop choices. Just want clarification or guidance if I'm wrong

All legions have access to those elite choices (except the ones with mark restrictions as you can work out).
Yes infiltrating 20 bezerkers is crazy.

What about my army:
1 Tzeentch termie sorcerer
1 Khorne chaos lord
1 Nurgle CSM squad
1 Khorne CSM squad
1 Tzeentch CSM squad
1 squad of Fallen

This thread is over a year old. Please start a new thread on the same topic.

Thank you.