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So i've already discussed this in the past about Chaos just being 'Imperium but better', and it's been brought up again with RK being released, and in my friend's eyes, being just 'IK but better' because of the two new knight patterns.

I think by this point most can agree the similarities by and large between CSM and SM is small. Our HQs barely match up, nor do our specialist units. The fact we share Tactical Marines, Bikers, Dreadnaughts and basic tanks is just about the end of it. Each side has a few dozen options that are in no way related to the other side.

However, is CSM (And Chaos in general) just flat out stronger release per release compared to Imperium? I'm not talking purely for ITC or purely for ETC, or whatever. In a most broad, general sense. To me most of the new Chaos stuff has been downright underwhelming aside from the Lord Discordant, and neither of the new Knights come out as 'OP' to me, heck the one with the new gun is downright white bread in my eyes, a long range weapon and melee weapon has never been a good knight loadout, and it will continue to not be.

I'd say Chaos is weaker than Imperials. And that's one main component, being Guard. Guard are way better than their counterpart, R&H, and offer some amazing soup options for Imperials.

Your friend must not have been looking at the reviews of the codex, the knew chaos knight codex is not as good the imperial one. Does that make it bad? No, its just.... the same but a bit worse due to missing options (imperials have like 8 households to choose from, chaos gets 2).

Also as long as chaos doesnt have an imperial guard equivalent that isnt forge world imperial soup will always have a leg up on chaos in cp and artillery.

That doesn't make chaos worse though, and chaos really isn't just imperial but better. Marines for example have redemptors, primaris, lots of flyers, and better options in the fast attack slot that chaos cant touch. Chaos has demonic engines, deamons, and lots of unqiue elite options. The forces are not the same anymore. They just play differently.

Being a distinctly different army isn't necessarily a bad thing, Chaos mostly was just "Imperial Marines++" for a long time. Which was frustrating if you played an Imperial chapter since Chaos could almost always out-perform your units and frequently paid less to do it.

Generally I think Chaos doing it's own thing is an improvement.

Chaos is indeed better, if you're comparing it to power armor marines. Power armor in general is just bad... chaos can supplement it with daemons and cultists easily and make it much stronger. Now, imperial knights and guard, I'd argue are on equal footing with chaos. They're both great codex that have answers for anything chaos can throw at them.

 Horst wrote:
Chaos is indeed better, if you're comparing it to power armor marines. Power armor in general is just bad... chaos can supplement it with daemons and cultists easily and make it much stronger. Now, imperial knights and guard, I'd argue are on equal footing with chaos. They're both great codex that have answers for anything chaos can throw at them.

Tell me, what were cultists before ? 4ppm without a 5+sv or orders?
What are cultists now?
No orders no5+sv worse morale and No traits. oh and a 25% price increase on top per model

So i call BS on the cultist part of your argument.

Also ironically the CSM do have a leg up over SM mostly because of the RC trait and bonus CP. Altough ofcourse still beeing Normal marines hurts that performance aswell.

the RC trait is more of an answer to people wanting to take chaos space marines in a chaos space marines army.

BrianDavion wrote:
the RC trait is more of an answer to people wanting to take chaos space marines in a chaos space marines army.

Frankly it's the answer for SM problems generating to few CP.
Imo should've been a blanket fix for All forms of regular SMs ehhh.

Not Online!!! wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
the RC trait is more of an answer to people wanting to take chaos space marines in a chaos space marines army.

Frankly it's the answer for SM problems generating to few CP.
Imo should've been a blanket fix for All forms of regular SMs ehhh.

well who knows, Maybe the blood ravens Chapter tactics will give something similer if you take 3 units of tactical marines or intercessors.

Not Online!!! wrote:

 Horst wrote:
Chaos is indeed better, if you're comparing it to power armor marines. Power armor in general is just bad... chaos can supplement it with daemons and cultists easily and make it much stronger. Now, imperial knights and guard, I'd argue are on equal footing with chaos. They're both great codex that have answers for anything chaos can throw at them.

Tell me, what were cultists before ? 4ppm without a 5+sv or orders?
What are cultists now?
No orders no5+sv worse morale and No traits. oh and a 25% price increase on top per model

So i call BS on the cultist part of your argument.

Also ironically the CSM do have a leg up over SM mostly because of the RC trait and bonus CP. Altough ofcourse still beeing Normal marines hurts that performance aswell.

Cultists aren't great, but their better than any unit Space Marines have. Tide of Traitors and Veterans of the Long War are IMO more powerful than orders anyway.

Don't the new Chaos Knights have a worse Invuln save?

 Horst wrote:

Cultists aren't great, but their better than any unit Space Marines have.

Agreed. In practice, you can just run Guardsmen. But if we're comparing codex to codex, Marines would definitely like to have Cultists even at 5ppm.

The Chaos Marines codex is undoubtedly more powerful than the Space Marine codex, in my opinion. You have a proper chaff unit plus Daemon Prince which are one of the best units in the game. Pure marines would really struggle against a list optimising that, with the only real contender being Guilliman gunline.

To make the arguement clear, I'm not just comparing SM to CSM. We're talking the two grand factions as a whole.

 vaklor4 wrote:
To make the arguement clear, I'm not just comparing SM to CSM. We're talking the two grand factions as a whole.

So my reading comprehension is a.ok.

 vaklor4 wrote:
To make the arguement clear, I'm not just comparing SM to CSM. We're talking the two grand factions as a whole.

then I'd say IoM has a big advantage, if only due to options, but chaos is catching up. Chaos is definatly in the best position it's been in in ages, not even from a rules POV but when I started 40k in 5th edition, you almost felt that despite supposivly being the big bad,c haos was forgotten about, Tyranids and Necrons where the threats to the IoM that people where talking about etc. Now, yeah now it definatly feels like the conflcit between chaos and the IoM is the center piece again. Tyranids, Necrons Tau, etc.. feel less like the primary narrative threat

Chaos Space Marines largely were trash from 4th up until 8th. That was when they were pretty much "Loyalists with spikes and less units."

If you're arguing it based on Soup... well, Loyal 32.

Poor Xenos.

 Arbitrator wrote:
Chaos Space Marines largely were trash from 4th up until 8th. That was when they were pretty much "Loyalists with spikes and less units."

If you're arguing it based on Soup... well, Loyal 32.

Poor Xenos.

kinda my point TBH. that said I'm also argueing narratively. you mostly saw mention of Tyranid threats back when I started. and chaos was downplayed to such an extent that during 6th/7th GW tried to make Crimson fething Slaughter the new posterboy instead of the Black Legion.

now with 8th edition you really feel that abaddon and the long war are back in the narrative crosshairs as it where

SemperMortis wrote:
Don't the new Chaos Knights have a worse Invuln save?

No. Invuln saves are identical to what base Imperial Knights have.