Hellbrutes - any place for them in a chaos list?

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**Khaine's Wrath**

As a big chaos fan, I'm slightly disappointed at the lack of exceptional units in the codex. This aside they have a few average/good units and it's not too difficult to build a semi decent list.

Personally I have never found a use for hell brutes. Which was never a problem as it was a single model from the DV box set. However, the impending release of the new brute plastic kit allows you to build pretty much every option, and it is also a very nice looking kit.

So I was wondering, how do people play them? Do people play them and to what level of success? And overall, is there a place for them at all?

Cheers guys.

**Dakkamite**

I run three Hellbrutes in my Khornate warband. They're totally gak lol. Hopefully Crimson Slaughter has some neat tricks for them - I've been thinking of fluffing the warband that way since the rumours for it came out like the day after I started it

**wuestenfux**

Is there any place? The same question has been asked about the old Chaos Dread, and he have had no place.

**Big Blind Bill**

I've seen people run a couple alongside mauler fiends in a plague zombie army.

Overall though they are out of luck. A dread, weak by its very nature, with poor shooting options for its cost, in a very shooting orientated edition.
Its not just a choas thing. The only imperial dreads that see any regular use now are the mortis (for anti air), possibly grey knight riflemen and then the contempters.

**Khaine's Wrath**

wuestenfux wrote:
Is there any place? The same question has been asked about the old Chaos Dread, and he have had no place.

Yeah, that was my fear!

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Can plague zombie armies be competitive?

**Khorvahn**

I run 2 hellbrutes in my iron warriors with missile launchers and reaper auto cannons behind an aegis with a warp smith nearby manning a quad gun. That's 8 auto cannon shots and 2 missiles I also run lots of rhinos he'll drakes and tanks. Works decent.

**Radical_Edward**

Hellbrutes shine at points levels 1000 and under, where there are less threats that can pop them first turn. The problem in playing them in larger games is that they are too fragile and will often give up first blood. They are cheap and are perfect big guns for 500 points brackets though.

**Musashi363**

Three hellbrutes and three forgefiends for alot of armor saturation dakka. Would I take it to a tournament? Probably not. But is it FUN (I know, a dirty word), yes, it is fun.

**SRSFACE**

Why does everyone add a second L into Helbrute and Heldrake?

Honest curiosity.

**Elgrun**

Cause Hell has two L's and its a easy mistake to make.

**greg0985**

SRSFACE wrote:
Why does everyone add a second L into Helbrute and Heldrake?

Honest curiosity.

Probably because this seems like a more Germanic styled name in a predominantly english speaking game community. I'm assuming that the 'hel' in Helbrute is more a reference to hell, the biblical place, and less to Hel, the Norse god(dess?). Also, whilst typing this, my iPads auto-correct changed the 'Hel' to 'Hell' about twenty times lol.

On topic: I have a lot of success using helbrutes as cheap armour saturation. When you're being rushed down by a vindicator, a maulerfiend, Khornate raptors, and a land raider filled to the top with Khorne berserkers and Kharn, the naked helbrute is usually the least of your worries, but if it gets through, you'd be surprised the amount of hurt it can cause. If it doesn't get through, that means my opponent wasted firepower on it and not my other units.

**Ashiraya**

Helbrute and Heldrake is just GW wanting to be special.

Like 'Daemon' when it is called 'demon' everywhere else.

**Motograter**

They can do enough damage if used right. Yes they are fairly weak as are most walkers but with the right application can be deadly

**ZultanQ**

Musashi363 wrote:
Three hellbrutes and three forgefiends for alot of armor saturation dakka. Would I take it to a tournament? Probably not. But is it FUN (I know, a dirty word), yes, it is fun.

Pretty much this, about the only thing I can think of helbrutes being useful for is if you maxed out your HS slots but didn't take any rhinos. Then helbrutes can take a little heat off your other stuff but not if your opponent knows how crap helbrutes are because they'll still just ignore them. So yeah, still useless.

**khaoschaos**

I have two helbrutes and only use them to buff infantry gunline.
Mind you one of them did blow up a heldrake with its multi melta, but then heldrake crashed and destroyed my second brute.
I'm hoping they got some sort of upgrade in crimson slaughter supplement cause without numbers these guys are bad.
Also as a little pointer why can't the warpsmith make them elite and heavy choices. You see them in loyalist lists but not chaos and I think it would be cool and fluffy

**darkcloak**

I actually had some success with a Helbrute very recently. 1500pts vs Tau, and I ran the 'Brute with a TL Las and a Launcher. This is the very best I figure because it kind of reduces the effects of the Crazed table. If you have two guns and you roll a Fire Frenzy... plus the way it's worded, you don't actually have to move the model if no one is in range. Or something like that, I never had to roll on the Crazed table this last game because the lil' ol' Helbrute wasn't a priority target. My two Las Preds on the other hand? Popped. Also the 'Brute is pretty easy to get behind cover so the few shots that did come his way were easy to save.

Personally I like the Helbrute like I like my Dreadnought. Shooty.

**changerofways**

If you can get them into CC range, give em two heavy flamers. I haven't been able to figure out how to do this yet.

In 500 or so point games, the standard loudout is pretty good. The mutil-melta is great for popping vehicles, and the power fist is great for doubling out the opponents HQ

In larger point games, you'll want to give them either Reaper AC and ML/TL Lascannon and ML

**Khaine's Wrath**

The way it sounds, in larger point games I'm better off not taking them at all!

I'm glad I'm not missing a trick though, I'm glad they're as terrible as I thought, even though I love the look of the new ones!

**wtnind**

I played 3 of them for a while but they were baddie bad so i converted them all into daemon princes

**kronk**

If you could take them in a squadron of 3?

Damn, I'd be all over them!

**whitedragon**

I've had marginal success with the following loadouts:

- Reaper Autocannon + Missile Launcher as a cheap sorta "Chaos Rifleman" kinda. Stick behind Aegis line and have a Warpsmith for extra funz. Not good on the Crazed tabled though, but relatively cheap enough that its ok.

- Lascannon/Multi-melta + Powerfist. Depending on the environment you can either hug the Aegis or walk around on your own, but this loadout gives you a gun that can do something, and leaves you with a fist in case you do have to charge something (or go Crazed). The Lascannon works better being farther away more often than not, and the Multi-melta is too short ranged to hide behind an Aegis all game, so YMMV depending on how you do it.

In either of these cases, we're not talking about a lone helbrute, but 2 to 3 of them, and maybe even a Warpsmith to babysit.

Ideally I would rather put them in Drop Pods, but Chaos doesn't have that option. The problem I always run into is that since I play World Eaters, I want my dreads running around with 2x Powerfists and punching things, but unfortunately AV12 aint what it used to be, and they are very slow and Maulerfiends are apparently the thing to do that with.

However, you can make a pretty shooty gunline with shooty helbrutes, shooty CSM's and Havocs/Oblits or whatever. Just make sure you have some fast stuff to play keep away or what not, or just take 2x heldrakes and then it doesn't really matter against most opponents.

**blaktoof**

Hellbrutes would be a lot better if they had It will not die.

**SRSFACE**

Helbrutes if they had a drop pod option would be awesome. I would run double DCCW + heavy flamer Helbrutes all the time if I could actually get them into close combat.

As is, though, they are simply an inferior shooting option for the points than Obliterators or Predators. They take up a different force org slot, that being the only reason you'd take one.

**Motograter**

Helbrutes could do with +1 armour and gaining monstrous creature and losing walker. Why mc, why not gw have essentially made them non dread. It would certainly help them.

**Andilus Greatsword**

At this rate, GW could probably just ditch the Walker rules entirely...

**wtnind**

Andilus Greatsword wrote:
At this rate, GW could probably just ditch the Walker rules entirely...

Except for Super-Heavy walkers ofcourse.

**Blackskull**

I use at least one and sometimes 2, csm has more walkers than all other dexes, so learn to like walker. CSM has no awesome super win units so literally everything is viable, even drake is loosing out now that people are bringing anti flyer material.

our strength lies in dirty tricks and cheap guns

brutes are smaller than tanks so can squeeze in dense terrain and use rhinos to block line of sight. cheap legal trick is the shuffle door. move rhino 6 inches out of the way fire the brutes guns, then in the same shooting phase move rhino flat out backwards to cover the brute again.

drake spam is pretty much our only tourney viable list, but we are now the new orks of 40k, in it for fun

**Ailaros**

This was the best I could figure out:

Ailaros wrote:
Wait, I just had a silly idea. What about the hellbrute as an MC-killer?

Think about it. Yes, a pred can throw out more dakka, having both a twin-linked lascannon AND a pair of extra lascannons, but that also costs more than the hellbrute (with the lascannon), and the moment that the MC even pretends to get into close combat, that predator is instantly toast. Meanwhile, the hellbrute isn't.

On the other side, for the same price you have the maulerfiend, and the maulerfiend does have the magma cutters, and it can get into close combat more quickly... but it HAS to get into close combat to do anything at all. Meanwhile, the hellbrute can blast things with its lascannon.

But that's not all, the maulerfiend is WS3, which means a lot of stuff out there hits it on 3's. That's bad because it only has I3, which means that it strikes after MCs, rather than concurrently. Meanwhile, the hellbrute gets to attack at I4, and stuff only hits it on 4's, unless you take a 10 point upgrade, in which case there's a one in three chance that they only hit the vehicle on 5's. The takeaway is that the hellbrute is going to put a wound or two on the MC, while the maulerfiend is likely going to get killed before he gets to attack.

So, let's take an example. A dreadknight against a pred will get shot at once, or maybe twice by the pred as the dreadknight shunts in and then blows it up. The dreadknight likely survives at half strength. A dreadknight against a maulerfiend will see 4 or 5 doomfists bash into the maulerfiend, possibly killing it, and, if it doesn't, the maulerfiend puts down a wound or two on the dreadknight and then is killed the next turn. You could give the maulerfiend lash whips, but then he looses free melta hits, and the result is still probably a dead maulerfiend before a dread dreadknight.

Then look at the hellbrute. He'll throw a wound off with his lascannon as the MC shunts forward. And he can charge into close combat, meaning he puts down another wound (thanks to hitting on 3's). The dreadknight has the same maybe kills it, maybe doesn't as the maulerfiend (if a little better), and then the next turn, it ends. If the flails manage to roll a 5 or 6 on two attempts, then the hellbrute wins because the dreadknight just can't connect.

Not, perhaps, the far and away best, but still better. Most importantly, though, it's not obviously weak anywhere. It's not going to fold to move+shooting like a maulerfiend, or to close combat like a predator. The same is true for offensive power as well. Against a riptide, it can sit back and shoot, while against a doom of malantai it can charge into close combat.

And I suppose that's why it's an elites choice then. There's that elusive flexibility. It doesn't get it in mobility, it gets it in killing power. It always has the option to fight in whatever way is most advantageous to it, rather then being pidgeonholed into a single way of doing things that your opponent can see coming and thus avoid or exploit.

I don't know if that makes it worth taking, but I think that's what they were trying to go for with this model.

**Sasori**

Supposedly there will be updated rules for them in the Crimson Slaughter supplement.

I'm holding out hope, as I have 3 of the DV models, and I really do like the new plastic kit.

**drbored**

Blackskull wrote:
I use at least one and sometimes 2, csm has more walkers than all other dexes, so learn to like walker. CSM has no awesome super win units so literally everything is viable, even drake is loosing out now that people are bringing anti flyer material.

our strength lies in dirty tricks and cheap guns

brutes are smaller than tanks so can squeeze in dense terrain and use rhinos to block line of sight. cheap legal trick is the shuffle door. move rhino 6 inches out of the way fire the brutes guns, then in the same shooting phase move rhino flat out backwards to cover the brute again.

drake spam is pretty much our only tourney viable list, but we are now the new orks of 40k, in it for fun

This here is what I'm trying to embrace. Fun stuff, trying out janky things that you wouldn't normally see.

I myself prefer the Plasma Cannon/Missile Launcher Helbrute, in an army with 4 5-man squads of Noise Marines with Blastmasters. I have great luck with small blast templates, so covering those cowering squads of my opponent's troops, or hitting two vehicles at once are my favorite things to do! That, plus a Heldrake, and my opponent will often try to spread his units out, to the point where they're really not as effective, and I can hit more models than I would normally with something like an autocannon.