Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Alternative ways to look at Thousand Sons:

1. Delicious, Nougaty Center: Your havocs knock out enemy transports, usually housing less than hearty troops. Your infiltrated 1ks mow down the survivors as they pile out of their burning vehicle.

2. Board denial: Infiltrate them centrally or near key objectives. This will force the opponent to deploy heartier forces to deal with them and take said objective, to avoid casualties from your armor denying bolters.

3. Hazardous Objective Control: An objective out of cover? Right in the kill zone? Park the Sons out there. Then the opponent gets to choose whether to waste plasmas, lascannons, meltas etc on the troops holding the objective, or the terminators that are slowly working their way through enemy lines.

4. Last Ditch Denial: They're fearless. Set em out and let them deny key ground or an objective by taking one on the chin. They're just dust, after all.

I'm speaking of the Sons in terms of how they work with other units. Worried about assault? Throw a bubble wrap of cheap cultists to eat a charge, die, and buy the Sons another sweet round at double tap range. Worried about the lack of anti tank punch? Havocs at long range. Worried about getting shot at by plasmas/las/melta etc? Get terminators and other hard units to give the enemy hard choices.

1k sons are certainly not the strongest choice in terms of stand alone power, but they do have abilities that aid them in disposing of enemy troops and gribbles. Even the Sorcerer is putting down a small blast template with the possibility of strength 7, and additional wounds, at 24" each turn. Gotta love primaris.

I'll be using Thousand Sons in my CSM Lists, but that's just cause I think their fluff is the best. I'll be more than willing to put a little more thought into how I use them.

 felixcat wrote:

I want objective holders ...
5 CSM; LasCannon; IoCG - cheap an effective in the back.

That would be very nice, but you cheat if you do this. Only 10 man unit can take LC

I appreciate this write-up, as I've been somewhat conscious of this since 6th edition. When I was still using the old CSM codex, I was CONSTANTLY trying to pull Gate of Infinity to that I could teleport my Thousand Suns around the board. Played lots of games - never got it

:(

Putting Thousand Sons to one side for a moment.
Yes, infiltrating using Huron or Airman is a good idea when used with Flamers and Screamers.

Its not tactically sound to expect more than a 1 rolled on a D3 so work with that if your going to do it, expecting anything more could leave you high and dry.

Back to Thousand Sons. Durability is key so this suggests T5 FnP wins hands down. Plague Marines are easily the best troop option just like they were in 5th.

Having said that cheap units of standard CSM are still powerful because you can take 4 basic units with a few minor upgrades in a rhino for about 500-550 points.

Plagues with x2 Melta and Rhino will set you back 175.

Going for the CSM option is still very viable as you can free up points for other nasties like Spawn and Helldrakes.

Chrysis wrote:

 Exergy wrote:

yup the tzeench lore is by far the worst especially for a sorcerer as he has to target what the unit targets. The new gift or boon just makes you kill yourself with a 1/18 chance of becoming a DP.

I think you mean 0/18 chance of becoming a Daemon Prince. Or 1/324 depending on if you interpret the reroll of Daemon Prince results as a reroll (and thus only once) or a prohibition on getting the DP result.

the spell can create a DP, not the wargear item. Sorry for the confusion but as I was talking about the tzeench lore I thought it would be understood.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mr. Voidness wrote:

 felixcat wrote:

I want objective holders ...
5 CSM; LasCannon; IoCG - cheap an effective in the back.

That would be very nice, but you cheat if you do this. Only 10 man unit can take LC

and there is no IoCG anymore

 L0rdF1end wrote:
.

Back to Thousand Sons. Durability is key so this suggests T5 FnP wins hands down. Plague Marines are easily the best troop option just like they were in 5th.

I'm not sure that everybody here agrees that "durability is key." In fact I think that's part of what is under discussion.

You yourself point out in the same post that regular CSM are also good because they are cheap. PM are expensive. Doesn't that suggest that cost is key rather than durability?

Not to mention that we're also entertaining the question of what "durability" actually is. Is it just T5 and FNP, or is it a 3+/4++ save? Against boltguns, that's one answer, but if you're getting shot by a lascannon, or even a plasma gun, then Thousand Sons are more durable than plague marines.

 Flavius Infernus wrote:

 L0rdF1end wrote:
.

Back to Thousand Sons. Durability is key so this suggests T5 FnP wins hands down. Plague Marines are easily the best troop option just like they were in 5th.

I'm not sure that everybody here agrees that "durability is key." In fact I think that's part of what is under discussion.

You yourself point out in the same post that regular CSM are also good because they are cheap. PM are expensive. Doesn't that suggest that cost is key rather than durability?

Not to mention that we're also entertaining the question of what "durability" actually is. Is it just T5 and FNP, or is it a 3+/4++ save? Against boltguns, that's one answer, but if you're getting shot by a lascannon, or even a plasma gun, then Thousand Sons are more durable than plague marines.

durability is nice, but some might think that damage potential is key. Otherwise why take a plasma gun over taking an extra CSM? The plasma gun negatively impacts your durability while the extra marine in every way increases your durability. Same cost.

PM are durable, and now that they have plague knives they have similar damage potnetial in CC but they have far less damage output in shooting and 6th is a shooting game.

Yep, I was trying to point out that both seem very viable options.

That being Plague Marines for durability.
or..
CSM for cheap effective units.

How often are your units going to get shot in the face by a lascannon? Not very often so I think its rather a moot point.

 L0rdF1end wrote:
Back to Thousand Sons. Durability is key so this suggests T5 FnP wins hands down. Plague Marines are easily the best troop option just like they were in 5th.

Actually, I've found that durability isn't key so long as you have a proper understanding of force concentration. Think about it this way: T5 FnP doesn't make you durable enough to deploy in a more threatening area (ie deploying in range of 2 squads instead of 1 in an effort to engage them consecutively). Even if it did, deploying that way just stacks points against you, so you would cause relatively less damage than if you had deployed to fight 1 squad at a time.

Durability buys you a larger damage over time. If 1 squad of Plague Marines were able to engage consecutive squads of Space Wolves/Grey Knights/whatever, they would perform better than Thousand Sons in the long run. However, your opponent will try to shift the balance of points back in his favor. The longer it takes you to deal damage, the more points your opponent can allocate to the area.

The real objective is to be able to deal with his army at least as fast as he can allocate forces. At 13-24", Thousand Sons have the highest damage output in our book. I think that damage output is generally greater than the rate your opponent can move points.

As an addendum, I don't think taking more Thousand Son squads improves the strategy. You just need enough, and beyond that you exacerbate your weaknesses without improving your return. I need to find out what "enough" means, but I'm looking at a block of 15 Sons and Ahriman. Past that you need a way to bail them out of combat.

DarkHound wrote:At 13-24", Thousand Sons have the highest damage output in our book.

Except that's not true. It depends on the situation, and for the cost of those 1k Sons other units will be much more numerous, and thus put out more firepower. Rate of fire has always been the real killer in this game, not AP.

The only unit that competes is Noise Marines with Sonic Blasters, and only if they are standing still. Unfortunately, since you must deploy 18.01" away, you'll only get 1 turn of shooting if you go first (which results in just over 3 kills depending on the Blastmaster). Then the enemy backs up 6" and you cannot be in range, since following cuts your range in half. In comparison, a 10 man Thousand Son squad gets over 3 kills out of cover and over 2 kills in cover, but can fire continuously.

The other contenders are 3 Obliterators. Plasma cannons can only hit 1 model at a time if the opponent spreads to 2". Their best weapons are assault cannons, which kill 3 MEQs out of cover. However, Obliterators can't use their assault cannons two turns in a row, so like the Noise Marines, their damage falls off immediately.

The last shooting unit I can think of are tetra or quad plasma Chosen or Havocs. They cap out at 2-2.5 MEQ kills out of cover and every additional body is .11 more kills. In a full squad, Thousand Sons still pull ahead.

Plus, cost doesn't play the same role here. The name of the game is force concentration. Points costs are basically balance: 500 points of stuff should beat 250 points of stuff. Thousand Sons can let you cram a lot of points into a single Infiltrating unit, and their damage output scales linearly with that cost. That's how death stars work. You can only rely on 1 Infiltrate. Obliterators cap out at ~242 points while Thousand Sons can bring as much as 500 points to the party.

Darkhound....your glass being half full is far too dangerous. :p
Noise marines honestly shouldn't be standing and shooting anyway.

DarkHound wrote:500 points of stuff should beat 250 points of stuff.

And yet here you are advocating a unit that is 300pts on average and is beaten by so many things that cost much less.

You are throwing a lot of blanket statements and half truths out there, but I have yet to see any hard evidence to back up anything you have claimed in this thread. I won't hold that against you though, as that seems to be a trend on Dakka when advocating Thousand Sons as a competitive choice, because simply the evidence doesn't exist.

So Godless, how about all that math I did in my last post? Is that a blanket statement, or is that just evidence that doesn't exist?

I'd actually like to run this army through a few Vassal games. If you'd like to test your might, I've got some free time this weekend.

All that math? Right. You mean the two figures you through out there with no explanation? Not only is there no calculations presented, or any control scenario, they are values you have applied to situations that you have hand picked to suit your argument based on your blanket statements. In each case you started off by saying these units are the only contenders, which in itself is not even close to true.

The reason the unit looks so good to you is because you are trying to make it look good to you. Let's look at it in a simple light and put the facts on the table:

- They murder MEQs in the open, which is a situation that a good player rarely puts himself in (and you can't exactly force it; note on this later however).
- Against anything with a 2+, 5+, or 6+ save they are no better than other MEQs shooting, but are still paying through the nose for their AP3. That's not counting that in the case of 2+ saves, other MEQs often have some Plasma shots to mitigate that somewhat.
- Against anything AP4 or higher they are just as vulnerable as other MEQs but nearly twice the cost. Against AP3 or lower they are only marginally better, as 4++ is not all that much greater than 5+ cover (4+ for ruins, tying it off).
- As a Troop choice their primary role is to secure objectives, something they are not great at doing due to being SnP.
- They are no better in assault than regular CSM against most enemies, but they can't overwatch to make it worse, so your Infiltrating blob is just going to get pummeled turn 1. If you go first they deploy in hiding, if you go second they get the drop and unload on you.

There is a simple truth here and that's that Thousand Sons are nearly twice the cost of a regular CSM, but only reap the benefits of that extra cost in certain circumstances. They also are worse at their primary role as a Troop choice on top of this.

Now the note; taking one squad as an Elite choice to deal with MEQ, while allied with the Masque could have potential. It doesn't have the Sorcerer tax to make them Troops, they get to do what they do well by not having to worry about their obligations as Troops, and the Masque can make sure the circumstances needed for them to excel are always met.

They are an okay unit, but are overcosted and don't function well as Troops. They are nowhere near the best possible Troop choice (though they are not the worst). I would go into a detailed mathimatical analysis of this giving all different circumstances, but I don't have to prove a point here as the majority of competitive players accepted off the bat that they are not a competitive unit, whereas you are the one trying to sway that notion. As such I'm not going to argue the point any more, as no doubt you will hammer your mate you has a mediocre list and bad dice just the once and declare your anectodal evidence is law on the matter; if not then fair play and you have my respect, but it's the way these threads always seem to go, and it just gets to a point where there is no point in posting aymore.

It's not cherry picking if the rest of the army is designed to handle other eventualities. Flamers and Screamers are very strong against vehicles and 2+. If you also bring a counter-assault unit to handle 5+ save hordes, then all Thousand Sons need to worry about is 3+ and 4+ armor saves. That's how an army of specialists works: you take a bunch of units that do a few things really well and overlap them to cover all your bases. That's what I advocated in my first post. If you'd like, I can write .66*.5*.66*9 or whatever every time I post a number, but I assume most people can do that math.

Now, if the opponent really just wants to stick to cover in an effort to mitigate the Thousand Sons, that can be used to work in your favor. Standing still in clumps makes assault units and template weapons stronger, which you have lots of with this army. Additionally, his units move slower and he's restricted to certain parts of the board. You can take advantage of that by placing objectives far apart and in the open.

And I just want to mention that Ahriman isn't a tax because he is worth his weight without buffing Thousand Sons.

Runes of Warding FTW?

As for the Vassal game, play against me, I will play marine spam and stand clumped up and not in cover for your pleasure... :-/

The only way to win this argument is via fielding Crap Legion. :p

Just throwing this out there, toss it right back if you'd like. I run an Ahriman/1k sons list with Masque and have had some pretty good success with it. It's not as amazing as Lash of Submission once was, but it usually gives me enough space to pull units close enough to get 12 inch range for my bolters and out of cover or gather them up for any of my pie-plate/template weapons.

What exactly lets you infiltrate so many units? Is it an Ahriman special ability? My codex is in the mail and should be here tomorrow, just thought I'd ask now.

Also how do you infiltrate ork armies? Flashgitz are the only units I can think of that can do this.

Huron and Ahrimann have a set warlord trait that allows them to infiltrate a random low number of units.
Huron is IMO a better deal.

and there is no IoCG anymore

You know I keep writing IoCG instead of VotLW - yes a ten man squad not a five man squad.

As I said in a previous post, they're usable. You just have to allocate more mental and physical resources to getting the bang for your buck. I think they're perfectly fine for taking objectives, especially if they are the ones that get that sweet infiltration. Just infiltrate them on the objective of your choice and watch them try to shoot down a fearless marine unit with an invulnerable save. 3+ armor is very good against small arms. And anything that denies an Armor Save means that we have a 50/50 shot to negate the damage completely. And at that point they're allocating resources like plasma guns towards your sons, which keeps them away from any terminators or obliterators that you have on call.

They aren't strictly as competitive on a point for point basis as Plague Marines, but that doesn't make them not competitive. They have a place in a competitive list due to the special abilities and fringe benefits that they offer. A competitive list can have more than just min maxed plagues with plasmas and three times helldrakes.

 gpfunk wrote:
As I said in a previous post, they're usable. You just have to allocate more mental and physical resources to getting the bang for your buck. I think they're perfectly fine for taking objectives, especially if they are the ones that get that sweet infiltration. Just infiltrate them on the objective of your choice and watch them try to shoot down a fearless marine unit with an invulnerable save. 3+ armor is very good against small arms. And anything that denies an Armor Save means that we have a 50/50 shot to negate the damage completely. And at that point they're allocating resources like plasma guns towards your sons, which keeps them away from any terminators or obliterators that you have on call.

They aren't strictly as competitive on a point for point basis as Plague Marines, but that doesn't make them not competitive. They have a place in a competitive list due to the special abilities and fringe benefits that they offer. A competitive list can have more than just min maxed plagues with plasmas and three times helldrakes.

Useable doesn't make them "The strongest CSM choice". As a matter of fact they only bumped up from the weakest due to an addition change and new codex nerf to the sad, sad berzerkers, who at one time were the pinnacle of assault troops.

 Exergy wrote:

Chrysis wrote:

 Exergy wrote:

yup the tzeench lore is by far the worst especially for a sorcerer as he has to target what the unit targets. The new gift or boon just makes you kill yourself with a 1/18 chance of becoming a DP.

I think you mean 0/18 chance of becoming a Daemon Prince. Or 1/324 depending on if you interpret the reroll of Daemon Prince results as a reroll (and thus only once) or a prohibition on getting the DP result.

the spell can create a DP, not the wargear item. Sorry for the confusion but as I was talking about the tzeench lore I thought it would be understood.

I'm pretty sure it can't. It can certainly make a spawn but I'm pretty sure it has a restriction on Daemon Princes. I'll have to check my book when I get home.

EDIT: Just checked. Boon of Chaos (the spell, not Gift of Mutation) forces you to reroll the Dark Apotheosis result. So no, it's not supposed to make Daemon Princes. But as it says "reroll", RAW you still can it's just very unlikely.

4 Thousand Sons plus a Sorcerer is 150 points. That's not cheap. Especially for 3+ save guys. (That's a dead 23 point model after 3 bolter wounds)

Lets put some perspective on this...

35 Plague Zombies are 150 points, just as fearless, and have a 5+FNP for S5 or less.

Also, the guy who said Chosen don't suck, clearly looked at the unit before the points cost. Chosen cost too much, like everything else in the Chaos book.

Yup but plagues zombies essentially replace there saves with fnp as most small arms fire is ap 5 and they have tshirt saves andmost heavy weapons will deny them anything but a cover outright this is why they are a fodder unit not for objectives, and have you looked at terminators they cost the same as sw termies

loreweaver wrote:Also, the guy who said Chosen don't suck, clearly looked at the unit before the points cost. Chosen cost too much, like everything else in the Chaos book.

You preach about people clearly not looking at the book and then make a statement like this? It's always amusing when the pot speaks.

 Godless-Mimicry wrote:

loreweaver wrote:Also, the guy who said Chosen don't suck, clearly looked at the unit before the points cost. Chosen cost too much, like everything else in the Chaos book.

You preach about people clearly not looking at the book and then make a statement like this? It's always amusing when the pot speaks.

CSM Bikes cost too much, they should be 2.5 points each, have a 2++ and have twin linked lascannons.

I've been looking harder at the min squads of 5. That price for four guys and a sorc isn't really a bad deal. You can get 4 squads of 5 for less than I spend on my PMs. That's extra sorcs. Being able to run 4-5 small squads you can keep them separate and mitigate the risk of close combat hitting all of them.

Throw in some choppy Tzeentch squads, and then boon the hell out of them. Let the counter charge units (maybe with an apostle) soak friendly boon rolls until you have some real Badasses. I think it is a decent place for a deathstar unit.

I will dispute your 1ksons argument with Plague Marines (PM).

Take Huron if you must have the infiltrate, take a cheap Nurgle lord for PM troops. Use the flamers & screamers, as Huron is undivided, so just as fluffy.

Anyway, for their points, this is what PM give you:
T5, FNP. Hard to kill, not worried about cover or 98% of heavy weapons
Blight grenades- not worried about charging or being charged, these guys take away the charge bonus and are happy to rapid fire chargers. Especially with 2 plasma guns
Poisoned weapons- reroll any and all wounds against T4 or less. Close combat goodness
I3- no real reason to charge, since we're pretty much always going to go second. So rapid fire as much as possible, allow them to charge you. Also, power axe/fist on the Champion for the most part
Fearless- same as 1ksons, but so good now in HTH

For fluff reasons, I roll 7 PM, 2 plasma guns and either plasma pistol/power axe or power fist, as they're about the same cost.....and with the ability to walk 6 and shoot 24 every turn, I don't run rhinos with these guys, as there isn't a need to get them somewhere turn 2. And you're going to be trying to use the infiltrate anyway, so rhinos are just asking to give away First Blood.

So, I think PM are hands down the best troops choice in the codex (of Cult troops) when you know how to maximise them. But, everyone has to play to their own play style and flavor, so this doesn't make much difference if you don't want a slow, compact methodical army. Flavor and play style trump stripped down statistical comparisons anyway. Play to have fun with your army!