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I'm wondering why the weapons choices for Death Guard Chaos lords are altered. The regular one can't take a thunder hammer, nor does it seem like it can take two chainswords. The terminator one is very threadbare, unable to take a combi-plasma, combi-flamer, power maul, power sword, or thunder hammer. Any reason why these options might have been taken out?

The Death Guard Chaos Lord in Terminator Armor is limited to the weapons options in the Chaos Space Marines Terminator Lord kit. Simple as that.

The Death Guard Chaos Lord is based on older kits and does not include the Thunder Hammer because the only such model is a Black Legion model.

GW is strongly moving away from conversion work on models, only occasionally including rules for intentional kit bashing.

Because GW can't decide if conversions are good or not so they decided yes but also no. The no Thunder Hammer on a PA Lord is a weird one though. It's a generic CSM mini just like the Terminator Lord so that's very confusing. TBH I think it's them just making really dumb mistakes with the DG codex throughout the book with weapon options and the such. GW definitely dropped the ball with the codex regarding unit options and I really hope they don't do the same for CSM.

I'm sure the DG Lord in Terminator Armour, DG Lord, and Sorcerer in Terminator Armour will be removed from the DG roster and replaced with bespoke options eventually. But yeah as the others have said it's basically just arbitrary decisions based sometimes on what a model has and at other times nothing at all

 Gert wrote:
Because GW can't decide if conversions are good or not so they decided yes but also no. The no Thunder Hammer on a PA Lord is a weird one though. It's a generic CSM mini just like the Terminator Lord so that's very confusing.

Well... it is now. It was Obsidian Mallet [with intentional misspellings] of the Black Legion from Blackstone Fortress for most of the brief timespan it has existed, a named special character with his own datasheet.

The thing is though, CSM got a 2.0 codex and DG got their 9th codex after Mallex became a generic Chaos Lord and the kit got a separate release. The weirdest part is it's the only plastic PA Chaos Lord model since the Exalted Champion is now a unit and Kranon from DV is not available. The inner thoughts of the 40k Design Team are an enigma

I think the not great and inconsistent decision on Chaos Lords was, "all the Chaos players have these from the discontinued kit, so let's not mess with the datasheet". So ironically, they get to keep their wargear options because they don't have a model

Same reason Deathwatch HQ options are hella specific: you got a "new" codex outside the main one and you get to suffer for it, just like how they went after Plague Marines and Blightlords for...reasons.

Best to ignore GW on this one and allow for the conversion at relevant points cost for similar characters from different factions.

Or play an older system. I would recommend this. But if you feel a need to pay for some GW marketeer’s cocaine habit, then of course buy 9th Ed books and house rule GW idiocy. I just hope that you have a big house, cuz you may need one ...

Yeah, with how the DG Codex und is written I think the CSM Codex might become an absolute mess. I can't imagine Chosen to survive the new Codex at all, or if they Include them they're either a CP Upgrade for CSM or GW releases the Dark Vangence Sprue separately and allows you to play Chosen with the exact loadout of that sprue.

 ArcaneHorror wrote:
I'm wondering why the weapons choices for Death Guard Chaos lords are altered. The regular one can't take a thunder hammer, nor does it seem like it can take two chainswords. The terminator one is very threadbare, unable to take a combi-plasma, combi-flamer, power maul, power sword, or thunder hammer. Any reason why these options might have been taken out?

Check models of dg lord on sale. There's the answer

 ArcaneHorror wrote:
I'm wondering why the weapons choices for Death Guard Chaos lords are altered. The regular one can't take a thunder hammer, nor does it seem like it can take two chainswords. The terminator one is very threadbare, unable to take a combi-plasma, combi-flamer, power maul, power sword, or thunder hammer. Any reason why these options might have been taken out?

Neither the thunder hammer nor double chainswords were ever available to Codex: Death Guard, so we never really "lost" anything.

As for the terminator version, I didn't even notice until now. Functionally the Lords of Contagion and the Lord of Virulence are just the "weapon options" for the DG terminator lords. The scythe/grenade combo, the plaguereper (essentially a better TH) and the double-flamer all are great options so either you would invest into them or not bother shelling out for terminator armor in the first place. Due to how few CORE units tend to be in the army, skipping lords completely in favor of psykers also is a common thing.

I'm not excusing that they turned a historically highly customizable character into a duo-build, but I also don't think it has a big impact on many people's games/modeling. If they had axed the terminator lord completely few would have noticed.

Voss wrote:

 Gert wrote:
Because GW can't decide if conversions are good or not so they decided yes but also no. The no Thunder Hammer on a PA Lord is a weird one though. It's a generic CSM mini just like the Terminator Lord so that's very confusing.

Well... it is now. It was Obsidian Mallet [with intentional misspellings] of the Black Legion from Blackstone Fortress for most of the brief timespan it has existed, a named special character with his own datasheet.

Even as a ‘generic’ model, Mallex has a Black Legion symbol sculpted into his left shoulder pad so the model is still BL specific...

Look at it this way; In a few months to a year adding options back in will be a surefire way to get all you DG players to buy another book.

Basically choice is bad, bad, wicked stuff. Can't be having that, and players can't ever get a hold of weapons not in a box the model came in to equip our units. Choices ?!? We hates them precious.

Adding thunder hammers to CSM by some inept writer who didn't know the lore was comically stupid to begin with (outside of rare relics like BSF prototype) and should be deleted anyway now. CSM always were differentiated from SM by having their unique stuff and old gear only, new weapons like storm bolters and THs were domain of SM. CSM are their own army, not SM +1 and their options should reflect lore, not ape SM.

 Irbis wrote:
Adding thunder hammers to CSM by some inept writer who didn't know the lore was comically stupid to begin with (outside of rare relics like BSF prototype) and should be deleted anyway now. CSM always were differentiated from SM by having their unique stuff and old gear only, new weapons like storm bolters and THs were domain of SM. CSM are their own army, not SM +1 and their options should reflect lore, not ape SM.

They're definitely NOT SM+1, that's for sure.

 Irbis wrote:
Adding thunder hammers to CSM by some inept writer who didn't know the lore was comically stupid to begin with (outside of rare relics like BSF prototype) and should be deleted anyway now. CSM always were differentiated from SM by having their unique stuff and old gear only, new weapons like storm bolters and THs were domain of SM. CSM are their own army, not SM +1 and their options should reflect lore, not ape SM.

I think there's no reason chaos should be barred from using modern equipment. Defectors would obviously take their kit with them [and most chaos troops are not HH suvivors], and even then the chaos troops that are true veterans of the long war would still be relying heavily on capturing equipment for their operations.

Since when were Thunder Hammers a Loyalist only thing. All Heresy Legions can have them as wargear and Perturabo has Forgebreaker. A Thunder Hammer is just a hammer version of a Power Fist.
"Modern" equipment is gear like Centurion suits, Grav weapons (specifically not Graviton) or Stormbolters, not Thunder Hammers.

 Gert wrote:
Since when were Thunder Hammers a Loyalist only thing. All Heresy Legions can have them as wargear and Perturabo has Forgebreaker. A Thunder Hammer is just a hammer version of a Power Fist.
"Modern" equipment is gear like Centurion suits, Grav weapons (specifically not Graviton) or Stormbolters, not Thunder Hammers.

Right.
1: Thunder Hammers were available during the Heresy/Crusade, so no reason some haven't survived in Legion arsenals since then.
2: CSM can "liberate" them from loyalists.
3: Nothing stopping the Dark Mechanicus from manufacturing more. They have access to Heresy era STCs, have no problem reverse engineering things like their loyalist counterparts, and can substitute other power sources if they need/want to (daemonic/warp based power supply).

No reason CSM shouldn't have Thunder Hammers.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

I think there's no reason chaos should be barred from using modern equipment. Defectors would obviously take their kit with them [and most chaos troops are not HH suvivors], and even then the chaos troops that are true veterans of the long war would still be relying heavily on capturing equipment for their operations.

If new CSM renegades ritualy destroy a ton of gear like A. Cannons, thunder cannons, razorbacks or stormbolters, new mk power armours, why wouldn't they go on and destroy the the thunder hammers, they had too?

Karol wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

I think there's no reason chaos should be barred from using modern equipment. Defectors would obviously take their kit with them [and most chaos troops are not HH suvivors], and even then the chaos troops that are true veterans of the long war would still be relying heavily on capturing equipment for their operations.

If new CSM renegades ritualy destroy a ton of gear like A. Cannons, thunder cannons, razorbacks or stormbolters, new mk power armours, why wouldn't they go on and destroy the the thunder hammers, they had too?

But... They don't do that.

From what I understand the lore about thunder hammers was that they were made after the heresy, and that chaos csm used inferior power maces, because that is the gear they were left with. I could understand if there was a csm subfaction, which could take imperial stuff with some limitations or points hikes to represent how hard those weapon are to get.

Instead of someone deciding, that after multiple editions the csm had had them all along since day 1. It just sounds stupid.

Also makes the removal of gear from other factions kind of a strange.

Karol wrote:
From what I understand the lore about thunder hammers was that they were made after the heresy, and that chaos csm used inferior power maces, because that is the gear they were left with. I could understand if there was a csm subfaction, which could take imperial stuff with some limitations or points hikes to represent how hard those weapon are to get.

Instead of someone deciding, that after multiple editions the csm had had them all along since day 1. It just sounds stupid.

Also makes the removal of gear from other factions kind of a strange.

Thunder Hammers existed in the Heresy.

And fluff should inform mechanics, but it should NOT inform points. Should all my Nurgle Daemons be at 50% points cost if we fight on a Nurgle planet?

Karol wrote:
From what I understand the lore about thunder hammers was that they were made after the heresy, and that chaos csm used inferior power maces, because that is the gear they were left with. I could understand if there was a csm subfaction, which could take imperial stuff with some limitations or points hikes to represent how hard those weapon are to get.

Instead of someone deciding, that after multiple editions the csm had had them all along since day 1. It just sounds stupid.

Also makes the removal of gear from other factions kind of a strange.

Except, as has been explained previously, Thunder Hammers are legal weapons for all of the Legions in HH. They're not a post Heresy design.

 JNAProductions wrote:

Karol wrote:
If new CSM renegades ritualy destroy a ton of gear like A. Cannons, thunder cannons, razorbacks or stormbolters, new mk power armours, why wouldn't they go on and destroy the the thunder hammers, they had too?

But... They don't do that.

I think it was a tongue in cheek way of pointing out that CSM don't get a lot of gear that you would assume more recent defectors would keep.

But thunder hammers are a Heresy-era weapon so that point is moot.

For renegades not getting "modern" equipment I tend to view it like this:
Most Renegades are not strong forces and are usually born through Chapter civil war, excommunication by the Inquisition, or immense bad luck.
In all of these cases, much of their more sophisticated wargear such as Centurion suits, Thunder-Fire Cannons, and Landspeeders are lost in combat/getting purged. If there is any left when a Renegade Warband reaches the Eye/Maelstrom they are unlikely to have the resources a Chapter Forge would provide i.e. Techmarines, thousands of armourers/serfs/artificers/servitors. These more advanced pieces of equipment will slowly cease to function or become irreparable. A Landspeeder needs sufficient technical knowledge to operate/repair and parts to function. A Thunder Hammer is a hammer with a power field, i.e. not that hard to make/maintain.

Maybe thunder hammers are like Mjǫllnir & only the worthy can pick them up/activate them. As soon as you fully gain the Chaos Keyword the weapon becomes locked & has to be left behind.

Why would a DG lord trade a plague reaper or man reaper for an inferior weapon like the thunder hammer?

 Jidmah wrote:
Why would a DG lord trade a plague reaper or man reaper for an inferior weapon like the thunder hammer?

I'm talking about regular Chaos lords, not Lords of Contagion.