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UNSTABLE ALLIANCE

Most war bands of Chaos Space Marines are drawn from many sources, not just one chapter like the Space Marines. They will fight together against a common enemy only if their leader is strong enough or charismatic enough to control them, but the gods of chaos do not always work well together and neither do their mortal followers. Meaning in game play that a Khorne aligned chaos lord can be attached to any unit except other aligned units (not nurgle,slannesh or tzeentch) and vice versa. Another example Tzeetnch sorcerer can attach to any iron warrior, night lord, alpha legion, word bearer or thousand sons unit but not any khorne, slannesh or nugle units. Third example a Nurgle aligned chaos lord can attach to a unit of of alpha legion troops but you cannot attach a slannesh aligned dark churigen to the unit also...the dark churigen must either be chaos undivided or nurgle.

FIGHTING WITHDRAWL

The Chaos legions have been fighting for a millenia and even though they have fallen to Chaos they were formerly Space Marines with all the training entails. This rule in game means that if they fall back from assault they cannot be over run by a sweeping advance, they will be locked into combat again.

LEGION TACTICS
The following four legions are marked chaos undivided and can join with any independent character whether undivided or aligned.

Iron Warriors/ Iron Within, Iron Without--The Iron Warriors do not worship chaos as some of the other legions, their bitterness and suspicion causes them not to trust in the fickle powers of the warp. Any time they start to notice mutation within themselves they remove the part of their body that is corrupted and replace it with a cybernetic augment.
All Iron Warriors have 6+fnp and Chaos Lords,and Warpsmiths have 5+fnp) not cultists.
If your army warlord is an Iron Warrior they have siege masters rule.
Iron Warriors can choose to take an extra heavy support option at the cost of a fast attack option.

Night Lords/ We have come for you!--The Night Lords are brutal sadistic murderers and a terrifying sight to behold covered in flayed skins and screaming faces when they strike from the shadows.
All Night Lords have the stealth special rule, Chaos Lords and Sorcerers have the shrouded special rule instead but not vehicles and very bulky models or cultists.
If your army warlord is a Night Lord they have the fast killers rule.
Night Lords can choose to take an extra fast attack option at the cost of a heavy support option.

Alpha Legion/The heads of the hydra--The Alpha Legion are skilled infiltrators and are adept at misdirection and careful planning to better undermine the enemy.
All Alpha Legion units may infiltrate except vehicles, very bulky models or cultists.
If your army warlord is Alpha Legion you benefit from the rule, Not the leader!
The first time your warlord dies replace an independent character in your army with your warlord, this is (one use only) and the first death not give a warlord kill. The model must be an equivalent swap i.e. Chaos Lord on bike can swap for an aspiring champion on bike not a terminator lord for a cultist champion.

Word Bearers/The powers have blesses us!--The Word Bearers are emissaries of the four powers of Chaos and can freely call upon demonic allies in battle.
Possessed Chaos Space Marines count as troops,
If your army warlord is a Wordbearer Sorcerer you benefit from the rule Demonic allies
If he summons demons he only perils on double six. If your warlord is a Dark Apostle he can sacrifice a unit of cultists for a basic demon troops choice of 10 models (one use only) (Blood letters, Plauge bearers, Demonettes, Pink horrors)

**work in progress**

World Eaters Preferred Enemy (x)/Rage/Counter Attack/Furious Charge--all berserkers have chain axes

Plauge Marines +1 Toughness/Feel no pain 5+/poison 3+ on bolters and plague knives

Thousand Sons +4 Invulnerable Save/Relentless/AP 3 ammo for bolters,heavy bolters and reaper autocannons

Emperors Children +1 Initiative/Fleet/Sonic weapons assault 2 rending
*Sensory Overload* if an Emperors Children unit assaults and makes base contact with an enemy unit roll a D3 and gain the benefit until the end of the assault phase
1 +1 Attack
2 +1 WS
3 +1 S

Special weapon-Blight grenade launcher 24in range poisoned 4+ small blast assault 2

Special weapon-Mutation gun 24in range salvo2/3 if hit a model must pass a toughness test, if failed the model mutates wildly out of control and dies for each model killed by this weapon roll a d6 on a 1 the model turns into a chaos spawn and attacks the nearest random unit. The spawn is not aligned to either side and will always move towards the nearest unit and charge if possible.

Heavy weapon-Warp cannon 48in range small blast strength 7 ap1 /gets hots/ haywire/demonic beacon--The dark mechanicus succeeded in creating a projectile weapon that works like a vortex grenade, it is not as powerful but has the ability to rip open space into the warp for a fraction of time. Not only is this devastating on human matter but vehicles can be disabled or destroyed...the worst part of this nefarious weapon as it acts like a beacon to the demons of the warp. Leave the blast marker in the area after scatter roll complete, demons deep striking within 3in do not scatter.

(Elites choice) Dark Churigen/ can take up to three...being trained in the dark arts of gene splicing and mutation within the warp by none other than fabius bile. These are the replacement for healers in The Chaos Space Marines forces. Grants 5+ FnP to a unit it attaches to, IC

(Transport Option) Warp barge/ is a demonic possessed hovering transport used to ferry Chaos Space Marines great distances across chaos infested worlds. Though lightly armored the fell energies of chaos provide added protection to this fast open topped transport, allowing the legions of Chaos to rapidly deploy and fight their enemies. The Warp Barge is a blend of chaos demon and desecrated technology blended together by the Dark mechanicum.

Sacrificial pawns these cultist have three types,you can only take up to 3 total models of any choice can be chosen as wargear for any IC. For 10 points per model each model dies after being used to its effect
1 suicide bomber large blast strength 5 ap 4 pinning must charge in shooting phase will automatically detonate at the end of move
2 crazed servant "for my master i give everything" by killing themself they grant one reroll in any phase to the CSM IC
3 psychic siphon any psychic power that targets the CSM IC and unit he is attached to can deny the witch on a 2+ *after the deny the witch has been rolled the siphon is removed*

Chaos Sternguard Equivalent (Headhunter Squads)

Ammo Types

Khorne Rounds 24" S4, AP5, Rapid Fire, Ignores Cover Khornes rage burns cowards from cover

Tzeench Rounds 18" S4, AP3, Rapid Fire, Gets Hot! Tzeench's sorcery melts through armor

Nurgle Rounds 24" SX, AP5, Rapid Fire Nurgle's contagion poisons the enemy

Slaneesh Rounds 30" S4, AP4, Rapid Fire Slaneesh's speed chases the enemy

Okay yeah, caps lock. Not even going to bother trying to wade trough this poorly-edited mess.

I wrote a chaos space marine codex myself last year, you can find i here:
http://www.fancodices.com/

Feedback is welcome.

I liked your idea of the sucide bomber and crazed cultists. Perhaps I should add something similar.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, I think combat squadding became standards after the heresy when the loyalist legions were divided into smaller chapters.

That is probably why CSM can take up to 20 marines in a group while the space marines only can have 10.

Aaaaand tzeentch is still worse than the rest. Nurgle gets +1T AND 5+ fnp? That is a whole lot better than +1 invuln and ap3 bolters. Bolters that have gets hot, so now your entire army has a chance to kill itself!

Thousand sons get +1 wound or a 4+ invuln save and take off the gets hot on the ap3 rounds.

Slaanesh should not have 5+ fnp, maybe 6+. The FNP was from a Icon that was new.

flodihn wrote:
I wrote a chaos space marine codex myself last year, you can find i here:
http://www.fancodices.com/

Feedback is welcome.

I liked your idea of the sucide bomber and crazed cultists. Perhaps I should add something similar.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, I think combat squadding became standards after the heresy when the loyalist legions were divided into smaller chapters.

That is probably why CSM can take up to 20 marines in a group while the space marines only can have 10.

Thanks for the reply flodihn, I downloaded your codex and I have not got a chance to read it fully but I did some of the ideas you had and liked it alot for the craziness. Specifically the khorne rhino assault vehicle...I will get back to you and and after I have read it fully and I might steal some of your ideas haha *sinister laugh* but thanks for the reply and info


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 McNinja wrote:
Aaaaand tzeentch is still worse than the rest. Nurgle gets +1T AND 5+ fnp? That is a whole lot better than +1 invuln and ap3 bolters. Bolters that have gets hot, so now your entire army has a chance to kill itself!

Thousand sons get +1 wound or a 4+ invuln save and take off the gets hot on the ap3 rounds.

Hello McNinja, thanks for the reply...I have not figured out how to do the 4 primary cult troops and I really didnt want to add an extra wound on regular tzeench marines. Maybe I could do two wound cult terminators? not sure...I wanted to get the 4 non aligned CSM legions up to snuff and make them more usable and then figure out what to do with the primary 4 I just used what was listed in the current codex as place holders for those units...I also think a 6+ invul is kinda pointless on a one wound model. But you cant give everybody FnP, I honestly have no clue where Gdub was going with that. Could drop the gets hot rule, I mean the standard bolter wielding tzeench marine is nothing but a ghost in power armor anyways. Any ideas would to make them better I will try to incorporate.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Filch wrote:
Slaanesh should not have 5+ fnp, maybe 6+. The FNP was from a Icon that was new.

Hey Filch thanks for the reply, I think I did list the emperors children with a 6+fnp...I wanted to do away with the Icons they use as it was kinda stupid (they didnt even act as beacons for demon summoning anymore). I figured just give them all the bonuses that they would get fully kitted out and just make them cost appropriate so nobody cries about being o.p. But again thanks for the reply I will try and get it up to snuff

Your thousand sons are actually worse than they currently are??!??? Shudder.

The FNP icon was in the Pete Haines codex btw.

 Filch wrote:
Slaanesh should not have 5+ fnp, maybe 6+. The FNP was from a Icon that was new.

Hey I'd happily take FNP 6+ for the cost of the current marks. I don't thinks it the best for option for Slaanesh though as resilience is not our thing.

For Slaanesh +1I is still good. They're I5 which is good in assault and they can have good shooting. So they need something to boost both shooting and assault. Allowing them to run and shoot or shoot then run with perhaps a +3" run bonus would be good and fluffy. Couple that with returning Sonic Blaster to Assault 2/ Heavy 3 or Assault 2/Rending and they're good. Also sonic weapons should not be considered a Mark benefit, they're wargear just like plague knives, etc.

That mirrors Eldar rules which is good as Slaaneshi Marines and Daemons should be a dark mirror to them.

What if sonic weapons were Salvo, AP2 and wounded on a roll equal to the target's armor save? They could immobilize vehicles on a roll of a 6!

...Ooorrrrrrrr come up with cool new ideas instead of taking stuff out the SM codex?

grav?

 raverrn wrote:
What if sonic weapons were Salvo, AP2 and wounded on a roll equal to the target's armor save? They could immobilize vehicles on a roll of a 6!

...Ooorrrrrrrr come up with cool new ideas instead of taking stuff out the SM codex?

The game needs less AP2, not more.

 Sersi wrote:

 Filch wrote:
Slaanesh should not have 5+ fnp, maybe 6+. The FNP was from a Icon that was new.

Hey I'd happily take FNP 6+ for the cost of the current marks. I don't thinks it the best for option for Slaanesh though as resilience is not our thing.

For Slaanesh +1I is still good. They're I5 which is good in assault and they can have good shooting. So they need something to boost both shooting and assault. Allowing them to run and shoot or shoot then run with perhaps a +3" run bonus would be good and fluffy. Couple that with returning Sonic Blaster to Assault 2/ Heavy 3 or Assault 2/Rending and they're good. Also sonic weapons should not be considered a Mark benefit, they're wargear just like plague knives, etc.

That mirrors Eldar rules which is good as Slaaneshi Marines and Daemons should be a dark mirror to them.

Thank you for the reply Sersi, this was the type of response I was hoping for, I think you have the best idea so far for Slasnesh Marines. I will drop the FnP and give them *fleet* and go with assault two rending on the sonic weapons...what do you think about a version of combat drugs similar to dark eldar?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 raverrn wrote:
What if sonic weapons were Salvo, AP2 and wounded on a roll equal to the target's armor save? They could immobilize vehicles on a roll of a 6!

...Ooorrrrrrrr come up with cool new ideas instead of taking stuff out the SM codex?

Hello raverrn, my idea was not to completely rip off SM codex I just wanted to make CSM more viable and give them similar advantages to SM's. Im not gonna give them grav or specifically have sternguard rounds, I just want them to be on par and usable. I like the flavor of the 3.5 CSM codex it showed off individual traits of the traitor legions.

I feel that "Sonic" should be a general class of weapon, applied to any weapon that relies on sound to do damage; ideally, this would also apply for stuff like Eldar Vibrocannons, Skitarii Transonic Razors, etc:

Some weapons have Critical: Sonic, while others have Sonic.
-When a unit attacks with a group of weapons with the Sonic USR, all those weapons gain +1 Strength and -1 AP for every two hits
-When a unit attacks with a group of weapons with the Critical: Sonic USR, all those weapons gain +1 Strength and -1 AP for every two rolls of 6. This bonus does not apply to Snap Shots.

In either case, the strength of the weapon cannot be improved any further once the weapon is at AP 1.

Only big stuff like Eldar Vibro Cannons, or Sonic Lances would get the full on Sonic USR, while smaller infantry weapons like Slaaneshi Sonic Blasters would get Critical: Sonic.

Warlord of chaos wrote:


Hello McNinja, thanks for the reply...I have not figured out how to do the 4 primary cult troops and I really didnt want to add an extra wound on regular tzeench marines. Maybe I could do two wound cult terminators? not sure...I wanted to get the 4 non aligned CSM legions up to snuff and make them more usable and then figure out what to do with the primary 4 I just used what was listed in the current codex as place holders for those units...I also think a 6+ invul is kinda pointless on a one wound model. But you cant give everybody FnP, I honestly have no clue where Gdub was going with that. Could drop the gets hot rule, I mean the standard bolter wielding tzeench marine is nothing but a ghost in power armor anyways. Any ideas would to make them better I will try to incorporate.

Thousand Sons could be nearly identical to the Legion of the Damned. They are also basically ghosts in power armor, so there's not much difference. Thousand Sons bolters should still be AP3 though.

The problem is that Nurgle/Death Guard is far and away the best mark in the current codex. People take nurgle bikers for a reason unless they're doing Khorne Daemonkin, and even then nurgle bikers are better because they'll live a lot longer - Fast T6 bikers are nothing to sneeze at.

World Eaters +1 WS/Rage/Counter Attack/Furious Charge

Death Guard +1 Toughness/Feel no pain 5+

Thousand Sons AP 3 bolter ammo/3+ invuln or 2 wounds and IWND. They're ghosts, they should be hard to kill.

Thank you for the reply Sersi, this was the type of response I was hoping for, I think you have the best idea so far for Slasnesh Marines. I will drop the FnP and give them *fleet* and go with assault two rending on the sonic weapons...what do you think about a version of combat drugs similar to dark eldar?

Fleet is fluffy choice Slaaneshi marines. I like Assault 2/Rending/Ignore Cover for Sonic Blaster because it fits the fluff better. I see Slaaneshi marines as being more raiders. Dropping the Heavy 3 and Salvo makes them mobile again. While ignore cover fits sound waves passing through foliage. The rending rule covers a couple to traits. Sound waves can reach a resonance frequency and destroy and target. Old and I do mean old 2nd edition sonic weapons had variable strength and AP values. Rending is a Slaaneshi thing so it definitely fits the theme.

Combat Drugs! Oh I'd do something like this: Yes I know we all hate random table. But the problem is not the tables its that with CSM most of the options suck.

Combat Drugs:

In your assault phase roll D3 to determine the effect.

1 +1 Attack
2 +1 WS
3 +1 S





Automatically Appended Next Post:
I think the problem your going to have trying to fix the CSM codex is the same one GW has. The codex has 4 main God factions that should be balanced internally to allow God specific lists. Which requires them to all be powerful enough to be competitive while using only a 1/4-1/2 the codex options. It's he same problem Chaos Daemons have, most people want to take god or legion specific lists than mix and match. I'm not sure balance like that is even possible without heavy restrictions or separate books.


That said the quickest and easiest way to make CSM more competitive is to expand our deployment options. Allow icon to reduce deep strike scatter to D6 for unmarked CSM units, and no scatter if the DS'ing unit has the same Mark or is a Daemon of the icons god. Add options for: scout, infiltration, and outflanking.

If Noise Marines had Rending they'd also become the immediate answer to Wraithknights. Rending autowounds on 6s and has AP2. Screw your T8.

Well, IMHO that's pretty much fine. Chaos needs a good answer to Wraithknights beyond melta/lascannon spam or hoping to get lucky with daemon summoning.

 Arkaine wrote:
If Noise Marines had Rending they'd also become the immediate answer to Wraithknights. Rending autowounds on 6s and has AP2. Screw your T8.

Why would Noise Marines get Rending though?

My fixes for Cult Marines has always been the following:
1. MoK confers Preferred Enemy, and Berserker Marines retain Counter-Attack and Rage. They can also take Power Weapons and such at the same price as Vanguard can, and come with Chain Axes standard. They now look attractive at 19 points, huh?
2. Plague Marines get Poisoned 3+ on their melee weapons and Bolt Weapons.
3. Noise Marines start at 20 standard. They have the extra CCW and Sonic Blasters are Assault 2 now, and come standard with them.
4. Rubric Marines get a free roll on a table (not sure which one), and can take Autocannons and Heavy Bolters with Psybolt Ammo.

I would like to thank everyone that has contributed ideas to this project. Im sorry I dont thank everyone individually but I am trying to incorporate as many ideas as possible.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Arkaine wrote:
If Noise Marines had Rending they'd also become the immediate answer to Wraithknights. Rending autowounds on 6s and has AP2. Screw your T8.

Why would Noise Marines get Rending though?

That was in reply to the suggestion of putting Rending on Sonic Blasters. It's a Slaanesh thing as seen with Daemonettes.

 Arkaine wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Arkaine wrote:
If Noise Marines had Rending they'd also become the immediate answer to Wraithknights. Rending autowounds on 6s and has AP2. Screw your T8.

Why would Noise Marines get Rending though?

That was in reply to the suggestion of putting Rending on Sonic Blasters. It's a Slaanesh thing as seen with Daemonettes.

Also of note is that the Forgeworld Sonic Dreadnought can "overdrive" its sonic weapons for free. You get rending shots at the penalty of Gets Hot! I'd definitely see that as a far trade if you don't want to just give them: Assault 2/Ignore Cover/Rending. Heck maybe include the Warp Amp from FW double shots if the unit doesn't move. CSM are already severely over costed compared to modern codices before you even start on the free rules and transports from formations.