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 Ailaros wrote:
As you can already see, it's mainly people who are butt-hurt that the current CSM codex isn't the old 3rd edition CSM codex which was hideously overpowered and had a few little fluffy rules that they used to use.

Let me just say there has never been a person I have disagreed more consistently with on all of dakka, and never a post I have disagreed more strongly with than this one.

The 6th edition CSM codex literally broke my 40k spirit. It may have taken me 14 months or so after that to finally quit the game, but there was never any question after I purchased and read that codex. It's not hyperbole. I never got over it, it was that bad.

Chaospling wrote:
One of my favourite "easy differentiations from Space Marines" would be to allow all unit champions to take Terminator armour.

I actually like the Chaos Champion rule and the Veterans of the Long War rule as they make Chaos Space Marines differentiate a lot from Space Marines loyal to the rotten corpse - the rules just need slight changes so they actually seem reasonable:

Chaos Champion rule: Chaos Champions may choose if they want to issue or accept challenges but only if a challenge is won when issued by the Chaos Champion himself, only then are you allowed to roll on the Chaos Boon table.

Veterans of the Long War rule: Needs bigger buff besides Hatred (Space Marines) and +1 Leadership. I would say the And They Shall Know No Fear rule should be added and maybe Adamantium Will.

Honestly, I would make VotLW incorporate some parts of ATSKNF, like they can roll to regroup even below half (ATSKNF still does that, right?). That way its not the same thing, as you don't get all the benefits, and you can still be destroyed in a Sweeping Advance, but you still get something to represent the training and the fact that facing the horrors of the warp (or a very angry Chaos Lord who got to his position by killing anyone who failed) doesn't work well for cowards. Also agreed with the challenge rule. Being forced to challenge is stupid and goes against the fluff.

It boils down to Chaos not having an identity. It's a bunch of random crap and some Marks and it's "Here's Chaos!" except it's nothing like Chaos should be.

The biggest thing for me is that the basic Chaos Space Marine is almost unusably bad. I didn't start playing Chaos with the idea that my options would boil down to Plague Marines or Cultists.

They are so bad that we have house ruled that they come with the following addition.

Mark of Chaos Undivided: This Mark grants the Stubborn USR.

And then they cost the same as SM that get so much for more

Here are some quotes from White Dwarf #199, August 1996, the issue when the 2nd edition Chaos Codex was released. Although it didn't have legion rules, IMO the 2nd edition Chaos codex captured the feel of chaos. Things like being limited with Reaper Autocannons, MkI plasma guns, chainfists, combi-bolters and the like still gave Chaos that archaic feel.

Andy Chambers wrote:
We wanted Chaos forces to have a strong theme so we looked at what had gone before and what people chose for their Chaos armies in the 1995 Warhammer 40,000 tournament. This gave us one overwhelming answer: Chaos Space Marines. Every army contained Chaos Space Marines and nearly all included daemons as well. Working with this we decided to make the main army list in Codex Chaos depict a raiding force of Chaos Space Marines from the Eye of Terror. ...

Andy Chambers wrote:
... The next things to worry about were how to make the Chaos Space Marines different from Imperial Space Marines: was it to be simply a case of different coloured power armour or something more than that? Obviously something more ...

Andy Chambers wrote:
To me the Chaos Space Marines needed to be characterised as a threat reaching back to the Imperium's past, a threat which had refused to lie down and become part of history. This is in part why the gods of Chaos are less pivotal in Codex Chaos; we felt that the motivations of Chaos Space Marines should remain their own, no matter how debased and vile. Though the corrupted Space Marines of the Traitor Legions make excellent champions for the gods of Chaos, they are not pawns and have their own agendas of vengeance, empire-building vindication or arcane study which gives them purpose.

Andy Chambers wrote:
Another interesting spin we came up with was to make Chaos Space Marine forces feel as if they had been exiled to the Eye of Terror ten millenia before the Imperium's "present" day. Though the technological advancement of the Imperium moves at the speed of an aged tortois, ten thousand years was bound to bring some changes. This suggested limiting the Traitor Legions' weaponry to some of the "older" types and making others dangerous, experimental precursors of the guns used by Imperial Space Marines. This, combined with the older patterns of power armour the designes have used, gives the Chaos Space Marine miniatures a dark, archaic feel which contrasts well with the clean, upright loyalist Space Marines.

Why are people not buying the Imperial Armour Horus Heresy for their Legion fix now?

You cried you wanted Legion rules. Now you have them. So what is wrong? Is it because Forge World is not "legal"?

(part 2)

Now here are some quotes from White Dwarf #274 (#273 in the US), dated October 2002, heralding the release of the 3.5 Chaos Codex, arguably an even better interpretation of the Chaos rules than the 2nd edition book.

The Codex formalizes the idea that there are nine entirely different Chaos Legions, each with its own strengths and weaknesses rather than a single homogenized force.
It had become clear to me that single-Legion armies were the preference of the vast majority of Chaos players, and the response to Index Astartes was all the confirmation that was needed.

I had already developed a clear view about whether to include Cultists and other Chaos-aligned troops, such as mutants and abhumans. The name of the Codex would be Codex: Chaos Space Marines, so the whole emphasis would be on the Traitor Legions themselves. Obviously, it would have to cover Daemons, as the Chaos Space Marines have the ability to summon them. However, i saw no good reason for including Cultists other than as an Alpha Legion options (and I made sure that these were quite specialized). Cultists work best as a separate army, and there is plenty of scope for a distinct Cultist army list to be developed further.

Obliterators and Raptors, troops types new to Third Edition Warhammer 40,000, had to be examined and moved forward. Clearly, the basis was there for two excellent troop types, but they had never quite caught on. In the case of the Obliterators, they lacked the endurance or firepower that their imagery (and points value) implied. Raptors were similarly very expensive in points for what they did.

Chaos Space Marines are all, to some extent, veterans. The long war has hardened them in a way only the oldest Dreadnoughts of the loyalist Legions could understand. The new Space Marines might have their Land Speeders, multi-meltas, and plasma cannons, but the Chaos Space Marinds have experience. That hs to count for something. To represent their experiernce, I detailed a number of Veteran skills drawn mainly from campaign experience systems but also from the special skill lists that have been developed to support the Index Astartes articles. ... In this way, any Chaos Space Marine can be fielded as a Veteran with something to show for his 10,000 years of experience beyond being able to infiltrate.

So, to sum up. THAT is what's wrong with the 6th edition Chaos Codex, and the 4th edition before it. They've lost their identity. It's no longer about the nine Traitor Legions, it's an amalgamation, a ragtag force of nameless, faceless thugs that exsist to get beaten up by the good guys. It's degenerated back to a "single homogenized force" with none of the character or flavor that lends itself to an army made up of twisted, corrupted superhuman warriors, some of which have seen 10,000 years of combat and exterminated entire species during the great crusade the likes of which will never be seen again, warriors that have fought alongside (or against!) Primarchs that are remembered only in memories of the oldest Dreadnoughts and in ancient texts.

Take someone like Bjorn the Fell-handed, the Space Wolf dreadnought. He fought alongside Leman Russ, he remembers the days of the Heresy and is revered like a demigod for his vast knowledge and tactics. That kind of knowledge and memories are what every Traitor Legion marine has. An Iron Warriors marine fought in the crusade with the great Perturabo, massacared Imperial Fists and likely shot at Rogal Dorn himself during the Iron Cage. A Word Bearer remembers Lorgar or Kor Phaeron speaking the first catechisms that set them on the path of damnation so long ago. A Night Lord recalls the fear in the eyes of his victims as he slaughtered them alongside the Night Haunter, and a Black Legionnaire remembers the fateful day when the Warmaster was slain by the cursed corpse god of Man, and in his twin hearts burns a vengeance like an exploding sun that one day soon Abaddon will return to finish what was started and avenge their greatest defeat. That is what Chaos was about. The Traitor Legions. Not cultists, not daemon engines, hell not even daemons. Chaos players played Chaos because they wanted to finish the story of the Horus Heresy and bring the final doom of the Imperium.

What we have now is nothing like that. We have a ragtag bunch of misfits and mechanical monsters. The Great Enemy of Man is reduced to cartoon villains.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Davor wrote:
Why are people not buying the Imperial Armour Horus Heresy for their Legion fix now?

You cried you wanted Legion rules. Now you have them. So what is wrong? Is it because Forge World is not "legal"?

As many people have said, that does NOT represent the legions post-Heresy, which is what Chaos players want.

Because Chaos Marines suck.

Codex: Chaos Cultists and Heldrakes is pretty good

SarisKhan wrote:I hereby christen us the Hobo Space Marines.

+1. Have an Exalt, because that is exactly what we are. And we're not even that good at being hobo's apparently, because we still haven't stolen a damn plasma cannon that doesn't have to be mounted to a Helbrute.

Davor wrote:Why are people not buying the Imperial Armour Horus Heresy for their Legion fix now?

You cried you wanted Legion rules. Now you have them. So what is wrong? Is it because Forge World is not "legal"?

Here are a couple answers, but I'm going to start with mine first: I'm fuggin poor, bra. I don't have time or money to order sh!t from another country just so people in my local club can go "Uuuuh, dun think so." Aside from that I DON'T WANT TO DO WHAT GAMES WORKSHOP SHOULD'VE DONE FIRST. IT'S THEIR GDDMN GAME. I WANT TO PLAY SOME FRIGGIN CHAOS SPACE MARINES. NOT "Bad Guy fodder goes down again. PS - You're flying daemon engine can't bend it's neck because you were making your good brothers cry."

But want better reasons? Yeah, HH Legion tactics don't exactly equate to Post-Heresy Legions. That's another arm and a leg you are trying to foot, and then you'll need those models to make the book work worth a crap.

I digress.

No matter how you look at it; Old Legions or New Warbands, THESE ARE CHAOS SPACE MARINES. They are looting the Imperium supply lanes daily, but we're not getting a damn Battle Barge with a new Landraider on it? We're exterminating Shrine Worlds and going to war with Cadia, but the IG/Astra Dooflunkus get a whole new army to reinforce them? AND they are "Come the Apocalypse" with us? DID WE FORGET WHERE THE DAMN CULTISTS COME FROM?!

I'll tell you a secret: Cultists aren't grown on daemon worlds.

There is a metric ton of stuff that the Loyalists need to give up. And if we're going to have to have older Mk gear, then that gear should probably be stronger. For example, if Get's Hot was originally a Chaos implement, then lets let Chaos keep their Gets Hot, but then make the shot S 10 AP 1 or something, for the cost of blowing off your own arm. GIVE US SOMETHING TO WORK WITH.

Something besides a bunch of random tables and the quote "The Gods are Fickle!" Yeah, about everything else. They're pretty consistent with the CSM's, even when they are sticking a tongue in their belly button.

I don't want to see a "balanced" Chaos Codex anymore. No one else is balanced. They all play to a strength. D/Eldar are fast. Space Marines are precision strike monsters. Orks are Green Tide Hordes that can cripple you when they land those hits. Chaos? We're magical. That's about it. We should be melee monsters and a lot are, but there isn't enough to compliment the melee we have and make it effective.

The 30k army lists are better Chaos lists than the CSM codex.

Let that sink in and you'll see why people are pissed.

It always bothered me that there are a half dozen loyalist space marine chapters with books and the LEGIONS of Chaos did not have them.

"Here is a book detailing the special rules for the 1200-1500 Space Wolves."
"Oh so they're basically Space Marines with a few unique units and renamed wargear."
"Hey, you don't say that!"

"Here is a book not dealing the special rules for the tens of thousands of Night Lords."
"Shouldn't they get a book."
"Nope, because Chaos is so chaotic and disorganized that it's pretty much just an incoherent mess."
"Oh. That sounds stupid."
"Oh believe me, it is."

Davor wrote:
Why are people not buying the Imperial Armour Horus Heresy for their Legion fix now?

You cried you wanted Legion rules. Now you have them. So what is wrong? Is it because Forge World is not "legal"?

1. The current HH Legion Crusade army lists do not yet represent the full influence of Chaos upon the Legions. It represents the Legions at the start of the Heresy, when a few have only just begun to "dip their toes into the pool of Chaos." Eventually, perhaps, but we're not at that point yet.
2. For some people, the legality really is an issue. in my group, we have no problems with Forgeworld, but I do know of others where just using an alternative Forgeworld model (but still using Codex rules for it) gets negative reactions.

Let me be clear: I do not desire any sort of overpowered Legion rules. I do not, for example, want the return of Basilisk-spam Iron Warriors (I didn't even play Chaos back then). Ironically, I don't even play a Chaos Legion: I play Astral Claws/Red Corsairs under Huron. If GW can throw out some simple Chapter Tactics for all those Space Marine chapters within that Codex (Hell, Forgeworld even did some Chapter Tactics for the Astral Claws), why is it so hard to just throw the Legions a bone and give them a little something?

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
For many of us, it can still be summed up as: no legions.

THIS!!!

A whole lot of THIS!!!

And the fact that it has no power in it compared to other armies.

7th just made them worse.

Wow WaynetheGame you sure did convince me they blew it. I played 2nd edition but only played with Chaos a little. I can see how veteran players would hate the CSM. Then again, I am in the camp that believes Chaos is Chaos and it all should be in one book, including Daemons. Guess its GW thinking they would make more money if Chaos players bought BOTH codexes.

That being said, I always thought it was odd CSMs didnt have whirlwinds and whatnot, but at the end of the day I guess you have to make the armies unique. Its got to be tough for GW to figure out what to include and what not to. There are allies tho, so if you wanted to add extra stuff like a Leman Russ and some imperial guard as cultists and call them a renegade unit, cant you?

Oh wait that is what 7th is about. Guess they cleared that up lol.

Davor wrote:
Why are people not buying the Imperial Armour Horus Heresy for their Legion fix now?

You cried you wanted Legion rules. Now you have them. So what is wrong? Is it because Forge World is not "legal"?

Combination of things. One, Forge World is still debated. Second of all, it's still not a joke cheap. Worth the price? Yeah but it's still a big chunk of money. Finally, and most importantly, it doesn't represent the legions we want. Does it represent CSM better than CSM themself? Yes. That said, it's still flawed. Death Guard really haven't hit the nurglified point, Black Legion is entirely different post Heresy, KSons aren't rubricate, there is very little in the way of chaos still. Finally, not all legions are even out yet.

I have always said there needs to be at least a third kind of Space Marine book for those that don't fit under the Imperium or under Chaos.

Barring that, I would like to see specific Legion books for Chaos/Traitor legions that work fundamentally different than your run of the mill Chaos. Alpha Legion, and the Night Lords aren't like the other legions, not by a long shot and if the Blood Angels, Space Wolves, and Dark Angels all get their own codices, the other traitor Legions do as well.

I have also said that there should be a Thousand Son codex that works similar to the Grey Knights for Chaos. There are still Thousand Sons that are with Magnus that weren't apart of the Rubric and could function with a Codex on themselves in a similar fashion that they set up the GK codex except their units are defined by which Discipline they adhere to. That would make an awesome codex.

If they would do this a create Legion specific codices where it wasn't just "vanilla" Chaos like it is in the CSM then I probably would pick them up in a heart beat, especially a Thousand Sons one.

Mozzamanx wrote:
What are these styles?
As I see it, we have 6 troops options available; all of them are infantry, 5 of them are in power armour, and 5 of them can take Rhinos. Supplements add 2 more types of infantry. We can take a Land Raider to transport them. None of them are fast, infiltrate, scout, deep strike or indeed have any special movement options whatsoever. Crimson Slaughter Possessed come closest with a D3 roll. Whoopee.

Oh I think it's worse than that. You're clearly counting our four special elites plus regular troops and cultists, but we also have Chosen, Warp Talons, Raptors, and Havocs that are all essentially identical space marines with a gimmick each that makes them a special snowflake. Heck, our Terminators at least have different armor as do our Obliterators, but aside from that and better weapons they're basically space marines. Variety for CSM only comes in the form of machine-daemon hybrids that are mostly close combat.

My old CSM army had a ton of variety and options because of the Legions and upgrades that used to be available. Now the army is very homogenized and you either like spamming troops or you don't.

Davor wrote:
Why are people not buying the Imperial Armour Horus Heresy for their Legion fix now?

You cried you wanted Legion rules. Now you have them. So what is wrong? Is it because Forge World is not "legal"?

FW HH armies represent the Space Marines as they fought during the Great Crusade and the Horus Heresy, not as they are in the 41st millenium, and these are *very* different things.

Also, basically FW came right out and said that those lists were designed to play against each other, generally at higher than normal pointed games (2k-3k instead of 40k's more typical 1.5k-2k), and not were not really designed with the 40k armies in mind, and had what amounts to the 7E FoC back at the dawn of 6th.

It's actually funny and sad that GW and FW have finally expanded the Horus Heresy beyond myths and legends. You can actually PLAY the old Legiones Astartes and renact the greatest betrayal the galaxy has ever seen, when for a small period of time it looked like the Imperium would be torn apart by civil war. Remember, it was only through luck that the Emperor defeated Horus; he came dangerously close to losing that fight and if he had, humanity would have been plunged into an eternity of darkness.

And in the present day, there's all this crap about it being the end times and the final days of the Imperium, and the timeline is frozen on the eve of the 13th Black Crusade, the one that's supposed to actually reach Terra and bring about the end of days, cast down the Imperium and reduce it to dust.

It's all been built up to Chaos as the great archenemy, the ultimate evil, the unstoppable inevitable end of all things poised to strike a final deathblow at the empire of man and cast humanity into Hell, but nothing reflects that in the game, and that's the most disappointing thing of all.

WayneTheGame wrote:
It's actually funny and sad that GW and FW have finally expanded the Horus Heresy beyond myths and legends. You can actually PLAY the old Legiones Astartes and renact the greatest betrayal the galaxy has ever seen, when for a small period of time it looked like the Imperium would be torn apart by civil war. Remember, it was only through luck that the Emperor defeated Horus; he came dangerously close to losing that fight and if he had, humanity would have been plunged into an eternity of darkness.

And in the present day, there's all this crap about it being the end times and the final days of the Imperium, and the timeline is frozen on the eve of the 13th Black Crusade, the one that's supposed to actually reach Terra and bring about the end of days, cast down the Imperium and reduce it to dust.

It's all been built up to Chaos as the great archenemy, the ultimate evil, the unstoppable inevitable end of all things poised to strike a final deathblow at the empire of man and cast humanity into Hell, but nothing reflects that in the game.

Nonsense read the 7th edition rulebook? It's absolutely hilarious. It goes on about how doomed the Imperium is yet, leading up to the 41st milennia, it's just a row of Imperial victories over and over. To add insult to injury, it removed things such as the Night of a Thousand Rebellions.

Games Workshop hates Chaos. -__-

 TheRedWingArmada wrote:
Games Workshop hates Chaos. -__-

The current WOC army book says you're wrong.

So they like the Chaos Vikings, but not the Chaos Space Marines....

I wish the CSM's had a bit more of the WoC in them. WoC are much better defined within WHFB, they've got the biggest, scariest characters, sorcerors that are as fighty as they are casty (and expensive to boot) and highly killy meat shields along with super killy and super hardy troops, and their cavalry is ace, but bring relatively little to the table for shooting (if anything) and (aside from Marauders) are all very expensive. Their "champion table" makes a lot more sense given the way the army works (most Chaos heroes and Lords are character killers, it's their job to go out and find the other guy's heroes and kill them).

Meanwhile 40k CSM's are basically spiky loyalists with less cool wargear and some Tac-equivalent variants.

 CalgarsPimpHand wrote:

 Ailaros wrote:
As you can already see, it's mainly people who are butt-hurt that the current CSM codex isn't the old 3rd edition CSM codex which was hideously overpowered and had a few little fluffy rules that they used to use.

Let me just say there has never been a person I have disagreed more consistently with on all of dakka, and never a post I have disagreed more strongly with than this one.

The 6th edition CSM codex literally broke my 40k spirit. It may have taken me 14 months or so after that to finally quit the game, but there was never any question after I purchased and read that codex. It's not hyperbole. I never got over it, it was that bad.

See? This is why I haven't put Ailaros on ignore: I don't want to miss gems of wisdom such as this.

"Legions are too hard for us to do so you're out of luck"

2 months later

"Check out the new feature: Chapter Tactics, pick up your limited edition (and 100% more expensive) copy of Codex: Space Marines today!"

Another way to look at the disappointment that is the 6th edition Codex is that there are too many broken units and rules. There are a lot of things that would be cool were it not for some fatal flaw. this is the way it's always looked to me:

- Eye of the Gods - this would be cool were it not for the fact it benefits to few in so few situations. It's actually pretty hard to get into close combat in the first place, where you could slay the things that would let you roll here.

- CSMs - would be cool but for the fact they have no reliable transport. They don't have the ability to deal with ranged threats.

- Khorne Berzerkers - they would be cool if they came with axes standard. As it is, they are not worth the upgrade price. Plus my point about it being hard to get into cc.

- Noise Marines - would be cool were it not for the salvo rule. Having an effective shooting range of 12 inches when you move is simply awful game design.

- Thousand Sons - would be cool were it not for the Tzeentch psychic powers table, and the fact you don't have much of a chance of getting a useful powers.

- Possessed - are cool in theory but rarely useful on the tabletop.

- Land Raiders - are cool except for the cost and the fact they can only target one thing at a time. Without POTMS, they are just not worth the points.

- Heldrakes - were cool before the turret nerf.

 StarTrotter wrote:
Honestly I wish you could purchase mutations before the game. I always felt it silly how fast you could accrue mutations in a single game. Plus mutations always got reset.

Yh, try "forging the narrative" when:

Game 1: Lord Pyros of the Death Guard gets +1 Str, +1 Toughness
Game 2: Lord Pyros has no such bonuses. Does nothing all game.
Game 3: Lord Pyros becomes a DP.
Game 4: Lord Pyros becomes a spawn.
Game 5: Lord Pyros gains EW.

EDIT: And that time Typhus became a DP, and you died on the inside, as he just became weaker.

Abaddon the Murderinator now becomes a chaos spawn or daemon prince for doing what he does best: killing things.

Strongest HQ becomes stupid DP with no goodies. WTF?

I was told that Any Chambers made chaos powerful , because he was playing them and like Phill Kellys eldar , he was just making his chance to win higher.