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I have been playing Wh40k for 5 years. I love it, I truly love it, board games bore me to death and I find all tabletop wargames silly… except Wh40k,I think because of the narrative, or of the friends I made along the way, I don’t know, but I am obsessed by it and think about it almost every day.

I play almost only chaos space marines, Black Legion especially. Khayon in the Black Legion novel says that the Gods of Chaos hate us, and I feel like they hate me… Chaos is fortuity, is the exogenous factor beyond our control, in this game is dices, and the dices hate me.

I won’t dwell in the many anecdotes of unbelievably bad luck, or in the statistical proofs of the unfairness of fate, just know that even if I win a good amounts of my games (also thanks to my friends that share my for fun approach to the game) I was so frustrated that I wanted to stop to play. No matter how much I reflect on my lists and strategy, no matter how many scenarios I consider, no matter how many battle reports and tactics I surf on the internet… I cannot escape bad luck: my warriors will always suck and fail miserably every epic action, failing 4’ charges, losing to guardsmen in CC, exploding on four consecutive 1s in psychic tests and so on.

I play narrative and for fun, which means no soups and no FW (whose rules I think are unbalanced and only exist for marketing purposes); and for chaos is a big handicap since every tournament player brings contemptor dreadnaughts and so on. I feel like monocodex CSM are inferior to other codexes, the last SM especially, and some codexes have also an anti Black Legion stratagem, which depresses me even more.

In the lore, which I love, the Imperium is indeed menaced and in disadvantage, but because of the many combined threats: CSM are always inferior, with outdated vehicles, weak 1 wound marines, terrible wargear, legion tactics, and with a long history of defeats… especially Abaddon which gets slapped by everybody! Nonetheless I could never stop playing CSM.

I realised why, because (as many others) I never cheer for the perfect character who as no trade-offs, no weaknesses, but for the underdog, for the loser; and chaos marine have just a couple of good tricks, but they will make them count! I did a double tournament with my best friend, we faced only Imperium players (what a surprise), fought Ultramarines with 3 executioners, Kastellan Robots castles, Knights Valiant… and all we had were just 2 warptiming Defilers, Tzaangors, poxwalkers and some stupid Blightlord Terminators (which were useless in 3 round games); but we outsmarted them everytime, hugging each other and screaming at every sweated and successful action. Even when always frustrated with the dices, I realised that satisfaction is not winning, but winning regardless of unfair luck and unfair rules!

I try to improve through difficulties, building identity and creating meaning. I cannot control adverse phenomena, just like the Black Legionnaires cannot control the cruel Gods; but I can fight regardless and embrace suffering like an heretic, the more painful is the fight the sweeter the victory… so after months of racking my brain, I realized that is fine to be frustrated with dices, it is all about the fight, it all builds the narrative of my Chaos Legions, which is all that matter: the Gods hate me, and so do I.

Heresy.

I won’t dwell in the many anecdotes of unbelievably bad luck, or in the statistical proofs of the unfairness of fate, just know that even if I win a good amounts of my games (also thanks to my friends that share my for fun approach to the game) I was so frustrated that I wanted to stop to play. No matter how much I reflect on my lists and strategy, no matter how many scenarios I consider, no matter how many battle reports and tactics I surf on the internet… I cannot escape bad luck: my warriors will always suck and fail miserably every epic action, failing 4’ charges, losing to guardsmen in CC, exploding on four consecutive 1s in psychic tests and so on.

Rip. Nice that you have fun.

I play narrative and for fun, which means no soups and no FW (whose rules I think are unbalanced and only exist for marketing purposes); and for chaos is a big handicap since every tournament player brings contemptor dreadnaughts and so on. I feel like monocodex CSM are inferior to other codexes, the last SM especially, and some codexes have also an anti Black Legion stratagem, which depresses me even more.

In the lore, which I love, the Imperium is indeed menaced and in disadvantage, but because of the many combined threats: CSM are always inferior, with outdated vehicles, weak 1 wound marines, terrible wargear, legion tactics, and with a long history of defeats… especially Abaddon which gets slapped by everybody! Nonetheless I could never stop playing CSM.

realised why, because (as many others) I never cheer for the perfect character who as no trade-offs, no weaknesses, but for the underdog, for the loser; and chaos marine have just a couple of good tricks, but they will make them count! I did a double tournament with my best friend, we faced only Imperium players (what a surprise), fought Ultramarines with 3 executioners, Kastellan Robots castles, Knights Valiant… and all we had were just 2 warptiming Defilers, Tzaangors, poxwalkers and some stupid Blightlord Terminators (which were useless in 3 round games); but we outsmarted them everytime, hugging each other and screaming at every sweated and successful action. Even when always frustrated with the dices, I realised that satisfaction is not winning, but winning regardless of unfair luck and unfair rules!

I try to improve through difficulties, building identity and creating meaning. I cannot control adverse phenomena, just like the Black Legionnaires cannot control the cruel Gods; but I can fight regardless and embrace suffering like an heretic, the more painful is the fight the sweeter the victory… so after months of racking my brain, I realized that is fine to be frustrated with dices, it is all about the fight, it all builds the narrative of my Chaos Legions, which is all that matter: the Gods hate me, and so do I.

Lol FW unbalanced. You meant underpowered.
Also you think CSM have it bad?
Go play a round or two of mono R&H to learn the real meaning of suffering. (especially in combination with your bad luck)

The tune will change drastically.
Sincerly someone that changed away from R&H to CSM to for once get somewhat equal long pikes.

Yeah there's some strong FW units, but no more so than in core 40k, and just as many terrible ones too.

I have no idea what this thread is about.

I hold with Lieutenant Commander Fabius, of the Emperor's Children; the so-called 'gods' are merely psychic effluvia. Pay them no mind.

Quasistellar wrote:
I have no idea what this thread is about.

Someone was a bit down about not winning much (anecdotally due to poor luck), but has come to terms with it by reframing it narratively in lore for their faction.

 DarklyDreaming wrote:
Chaos is fortuity, is the exogenous factor beyond our control.

No, Chaos (in 40K) isn't that at all. Chaos is our own psychological failings. Our anger, selfishness, hatreds, fears, lusts and so on. Chaos isn't luck, good or bad. It is an amplified reflection of the cognitive and psychological limitations of the human mind that trick us into believing there is such a thing as 'luck.'

Khayon thinks the Gods hate us because, deep down, Khayon hates us, and especially hates himself.

I'm not sure why you think that playing fun narrative automatically has to exclude SOUP.

I actually am of the opinion that SOUP encourages narrative- that is in fact why I like soup.

I've got a genestealer cult and a slaanesh cult that are recruiting civilians to their cause in the same campaign setting. Once the chaos cult has enough members, they can do a daemon summoning ritual. The game where it takes place will be set up so that there are multiple rituals going on, and the valiant forces of the Imperium can stop many, but they have really slim odds of being able to stop them all.

If a ritual succeeds, the cult player can now access daemons for list building. Once enough daemons come through, the disturbance in the Warp will eventually attract Chaos Marines- in particular, a dark apostle to direct the actions of the cult and a master of possession to assist with the daemonic allies.

What's not narrative or not fun about that?

SOUP is a tool. It can work for any job if you want it too.

Now if you don't like SOUP as a personal choice for other reasons, no biggy. Play how you want to play.

But don't think that only reason anyone would ever want to play soup is to min max a super tournament list to crush anyone. Many do it that way and for that reason, but not all of us.

SOUP makes my narrative campaigns more fun. Not less.

Yeah this thread is silly indeed, I just had some thoughts that I wanted to express, maybe it can be of inspiration to someone who struggled like me. It's now about winning (I win the majority of my games anyway) but on how stressful is sometimes to play this game.

Regarding FW, the point was to state that the same narrative force that drives me to play is the same that prohibits me to go more competitive, I don't know about all FW, but I know that there are some choices that are clearly better than the normal CSM codex, like Deredeos, Kytan and so on. Same goes with soup, which is normally the go to for CSM.
Obviously this thread is highly subjective, I don't argue about unbalances, broken units and so on.

Yes Chaos in Wh40k is something different than the concept of the real world, but as you see in here I mixed elements of lore, real life and gameplay... so I agree with you Duskweaver basically.

As a player that plays with a more competitive group, I can say that Chaos hasn't had it so well in a long time! We have lots of options, but many of those options require that you eschew your pledges to the Chaos Gods, and worship the great god Games Workshop! Sacrifice your monies upon its unholy altar and be rewarded with strange and powerful gifts like Disco Lords, Primarchs, Ahriman, Chaos Knights, or endless hordes of Plaguebearers! Mwahahaha! Ultimate power is within reach!

 DarklyDreaming wrote:
I am obsessed by it and think about it almost every day.

You and me both, brother.

 Yarium wrote:
As a player that plays with a more competitive group, I can say that Chaos hasn't had it so well in a long time! We have lots of options, but many of those options require that you eschew your pledges to the Chaos Gods, and worship the great god Games Workshop! Sacrifice your monies upon its unholy altar and be rewarded with strange and powerful gifts like Disco Lords, Primarchs, Ahriman, Chaos Knights, or endless hordes of Plaguebearers! Mwahahaha! Ultimate power is within reach!

Or to play competitive you dont play csm but rather DG, ts superfriends, and chaos knights.

Not Online!!! wrote:
Or to play competitive you dont play csm but rather DG, ts superfriends, and chaos knights.

Competitive is quite the bucking bull. There are some other things that can also be done CSM-pure:
#1 - Cultist spam.
#2 - Double-shooting, VotLW Oblits
#3 - Havocs with Chain Cannons
#4 - Chainlords
#5 - Fire Raptors
#6 - Daemon Princes

Those are all competitive options that are available even without branching out, easily enough to make 2000 points out of if you're trying to go competitive (and still not counting the Disco Lords that I already mentioned).

 Yarium wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Or to play competitive you dont play csm but rather DG, ts superfriends, and chaos knights.

Competitive is quite the bucking bull. There are some other things that can also be done CSM-pure:
#1 - Cultist spam.
#2 - Double-shooting, VotLW Oblits
#3 - Havocs with Chain Cannons
#4 - Chainlords
#5 - Fire Raptors
#6 - Daemon Princes

Those are all competitive options that are available even without branching out, easily enough to make 2000 points out of if you're trying to go competitive (and still not counting the Disco Lords that I already mentioned).

1 good luck with that one. Especially now.
2, is tournament unit and one of the few that work.
3 don't work, too expensive,
4, looks you into bl, is meh and worse then Smash campaign.
5, meh
6 competitive again.

All of these that work are still used as a soup component.
The dex itself is in a bad state, which is undeniable.
And it's also a convenient excuse for gw
" see the faction showed up in top list, balance achieved! "

That there are only 4-5 units that actually work whilest the rest of the dex wallows in it's sad state.
And the csm dex is by far not the only exemple of this.

Not Online!!! wrote:
1 good luck with that one. Especially now.
2, is tournament unit and one of the few that work.
3 don't work, too expensive,
4, looks you into bl, is meh and worse then Smash campaign.
5, meh
6 competitive again.

All of these that work are still used as a soup component.
The dex itself is in a bad state, which is undeniable.
And it's also a convenient excuse for gw
" see the faction showed up in top list, balance achieved! "

That there are only 4-5 units that actually work whilest the rest of the dex wallows in it's sad state.
And the csm dex is by far not the only exemple of this.

That sounds like a good excuse to be sour. Yeah, it's hard when only 4 or 5 units are doing so much work, but that's the life of playing competitively. So you better use what stuff is even remotely good to its fullest possible extent! Hence I tend to run Soup when I do Chaos. When GW gives the Ultra-treatment to my Black Legion, I'll love it, but I don't expect it for a long time to come.

 Yarium wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
1 good luck with that one. Especially now.
2, is tournament unit and one of the few that work.
3 don't work, too expensive,
4, looks you into bl, is meh and worse then Smash campaign.
5, meh
6 competitive again.

All of these that work are still used as a soup component.
The dex itself is in a bad state, which is undeniable.
And it's also a convenient excuse for gw
" see the faction showed up in top list, balance achieved! "

That there are only 4-5 units that actually work whilest the rest of the dex wallows in it's sad state.
And the csm dex is by far not the only exemple of this.

That sounds like a good excuse to be sour. Yeah, it's hard when only 4 or 5 units are doing so much work, but that's the life of playing competitively. So you better use what stuff is even remotely good to its fullest possible extent! Hence I tend to run Soup when I do Chaos. When GW gives the Ultra-treatment to my Black Legion, I'll love it, but I don't expect it for a long time to come.

Na that is the issue, the issues were well known and applied to vast parts also to sm.
Now csm allready got dex 2.0 so we are not getting anything, infact i think we will get we and EC split off before we get the propper treatment.
And that is mainly what makes many sour.
The fact that one update that was necessary was a bare minimum gakjob whilest the other one, once again, gets Bell whistles etc.

However since i until recently mostly played renegades and heretics which are so far in the guter it ain't even funny, it
Is still better.

That doesn't mean that we should however accept the shoddy Job and favouritisms gw Team has.

 Stux wrote:

Quasistellar wrote:
I have no idea what this thread is about.

Someone was a bit down about not winning much (anecdotally due to poor luck), but has come to terms with it by reframing it narratively in lore for their faction.

Oh my bad, I thought I was in the news and rumors forum when I saw this post, and was seriously confused, lol.

Removed

I'd say up until the 2.0 SM Codex CSM were the stronger choice between the two in 8th (after suffering for at least 2 editions).
As long as you're having fun everything is okay. Bad luck happens. If you feel it's because of bad balance try Maelstrom or simply go for narrative scenarios or talk about lists with you opponent.
FW isn't anymore unbalanced than GW, try it out, it has beautiful flavorful Minis for Chaos.