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Akiasura wrote:

How is this new update not good news for you? We have amazing cultist formations in spades, You have a choice of re-spawning, outflanking cultists that it is better to take a lot more smaller groups, or the Crimson slaughter formation which has re-spawning 1d6 cultists which is also useful.

I don't find the cultists useful since they are so easy to eliminate and slow.

That's the point. You take a 55-64 pt squad with flamer + autoguns or just flamer and than the enemy has to spend time dealing with them and you have 50% chance of them returning from outflank which makes them even better. It's a win-win formation. They're really cheap for what they get.

Akiasura wrote:

The problem here is the formation doesn't do anything that makes chaos terminators or chosen any good.

They get obsec and free VoTLW. It's good enough to run...but without fanatism.

Akiasura wrote:

Reavas wrote:


How is this new update not good news for you? We have amazing cultist formations in spades, You have a choice of re-spawning, outflanking cultists that it is better to take a lot more smaller groups, or the Crimson slaughter formation which has re-spawning 1d6 cultists which is also useful.

I don't find the cultists useful since they are so easy to eliminate and slow. It's not a problem with the formations, it's a problem with the cultists. I should have explained better, I've tried the crimson slaughter one and never had it accomplish anything of note.
Really, with cultists, I think they need better guns or a suicide option. If they died and gave warp tokens, that would be amazing. Or for every so many cultists that die your other units get buffs or something, making cultists a risky thing to deal with and the spawning matter. Or if they reached CC they exploded and for every model that blows up it's S2+Model and Ap 6 - model. So if I get 4-5 guys to your line you're in trouble, but they are easy to remove.

As it is currently most of my enemies just ignore them and it seems to work. I'll try the outflanking ones but seeing how easy they are removed and how little damage they do, I don't see it accomplishing anything outside of explosive dice. It could be fun against the weaker armies. I have a game against Saim-Hann next week

Reavas wrote:

As for elite groups why not run the chosen of Abbadon (black legion formation) It fits what you want perfectly
you can either take a chaos lord/sorcerer with a unit of chosen or chaos terminators. Bam, alpha legion, loads of cultists and a group of elite.

The problem here is the formation doesn't do anything that makes chaos terminators or chosen any good. Chosen are one of the worst units in the dex, and I own a lot since they used to be so excellent.
Similar issues with the terminators. They just aren't very good, attaching a caster helps but I'd rather use the caster with bikes or raptors now.
Again, not an issue with the formation. A free boon isn't bad, and the other bonuses are okay, but it doesn't fix the core unit which is awful.


I think what chaos really needs is a big deathstar unit sadly. All these psykers and good powers are just dying for a unit worth casting them on. The best we have is Nurgle bikes or Khorne Raptors though, which fall short of the wulfen or other melee units. I am not a fan of deathstars, haven't liked them since fantasy, but it does fit the chaos mindset of ultimate power resting in the hands of a few.

I dunno, I have played loads of games with both the crimson slaughter formation (personally I find it underwhelming) and the traitors hate formation which at first you may see it as unremarkable or just on par with the crimson slaughter formation but from my personal experiences with it I find it incredibly powerful when used correctly. Now with the crimson slaughter formation it was too easy just to wipe out the unitand the formation rules to be useless, now your essencially encouraged to run your cultists in on a suicidal frenzy.

Despite being underwhelming in reguards to strength the cultist unit itself is priced well in reguards to points. With the formation it forces your opponent to pump their limited resources into something that not only has the possibility to come back, meaning the wasted a turn of shooting with a unit. But also with outflank has the option to grab objectives or outflank into the enemy gunline. One game I had with necrons had my opponent pulling at his hair in frustration as his unit of 20 warriors constantly poured fire into this one unit of CC cultists only to have them come back on the same flank more than 3 times and unload some shots and flamer into the warriors. In the end thinning out around half the unit of warriors. You see, the value isnt what you get out of the cultists its what your opponent has to put into stopping them from grabbing objectives or getting into CC with their units. Which I LOVE because it encourages you to use them as fluffy suicidal pawns they were meant to be, after quite a few games with them I finding myself drop more and more long rang cultists for CC cultists in my lists just due to them being more effective in causing the enemy strife, your encouraged not to go to ground but rather charge closer without a care for their lives, as their deaths just mean they will probably come back even closer, which I find both fluffy and fun.

This is just my experiance though, who knows, maybe you will be super unlucky and none will respawn. But I do encourage you to try it out. Also on a side note, the BL formation I recomended also makes the unit fearless but you are right in saying chosen are overpriced but maybe try a large terminator unit with 2 to 3 sorcerers? Roll on sinistrum till you get those sweet 2+ re-rollable armour saves then roll on telepathy and biomancy. Sounds like it could be fun, not as good as most deathstars, but fun.

Chosen with OS are still bad. They're barely worth running with Cypher when they get to frickin Infiltrate AND have ATSKNF. Why would they be worth using with OS?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also any Necron player would ignore the Cultists until they needed the Objective. They're not frightening or even worth paying attention to unless Typhus is there granting them FNP. Which is then ignored by literally anything in an Eldar list.

 koooaei wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

How is this new update not good news for you? We have amazing cultist formations in spades, You have a choice of re-spawning, outflanking cultists that it is better to take a lot more smaller groups, or the Crimson slaughter formation which has re-spawning 1d6 cultists which is also useful.

I don't find the cultists useful since they are so easy to eliminate and slow.

That's the point. You take a 55-64 pt squad with flamer + autoguns or just flamer and than the enemy has to spend time dealing with them and you have 50% chance of them returning from outflank which makes them even better. It's a win-win formation. They're really cheap for what they get.

I don't find the enemy deals with them at all, that's the problem. The autoguns do so little damage that maybe they'll kill 50 points by the end of the game, maybe. And only from basic marines or other MEQs you don't care about. Against necrons they kill maybe 1 model per squad the whole game. Eldar just shrug and move out of the way.

If they were faster, they'd be better. Eldar and tau couldn't ignore them and they could tie up the bikes or tides at least.
If they did more damage they'd be better. Necrons and SM couldn't shrug their soliders and move on.
If they were a bit tougher, they'd be better. The melee armies couldn't just kill them before their next turn.

Against the weaker armies sure, they can be annoying. Charge a group of lootas for example, and they are worth their weight in gold. But the better armies don't take stationary backfield heavy fire power units anymore, and thats really what you want to send them in against.

Again, this is just my experience. I haven't played traitors hate, maybe they are better with the first turn charges. I wish they had a suicide mechanic though. My cultists do fine as objective holders but that's literally all they do currently.

 koooaei wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

The problem here is the formation doesn't do anything that makes chaos terminators or chosen any good.

They get obsec and free VoTLW. It's good enough to run...but without fanatism.

The problem with terminators and chosen (especially chosen) isn't really the lack of Obsec or leadership, it's their toughness or firepower. Terminators are slow for a melee unit and don't have enough shooting beyond the first turn to be a threat you have to deal with quickly. Even in melee, they struggle against the tougher units out there right now since they lack attacks (they really need 3 base plus khorne, then they'd be scary).

Chosen are marines that can cost nearly double. They die to concentrated firepower while really giving up the attrition game. They need to alpha strike a unit that is expensive and doesn't want to be shot at, and it's hard to think of many in the game that fit that role but also see table time yet still fear plasma spam or flamers. Scat bikers would jink, Riptides and WK laugh at plasma spam, Warp spiders can flicker, wraiths and TWC have invul saves...not a lot of targets I want dealt with that chosen can handle. As a melee unit they are terrible.

Not insulting the formation. It's not the formations fault the base unit is so poor. If chosen had say...FnP base and the marks were cheaper, this formation would be pretty solid. Or 2 wounds, something to make them tougher.

 Korinov wrote:
I see the old "you need to use Forgeworld" argument has now turned into "you need to use Forgeworld + Traitor's Hate". So, in order to compete against certain base codices (i.e. Eldar) now I need to buy my main codex, a FW supplement and another GW supplement.

Fantastic.

Your alternative is not to use Traitors Hate. I don't see that as the superior alternative.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 koooaei wrote:


Is that the rule for this formation?

Anywayz, the way it can work is if you have a dimensional key + something like a pod or scouting dogs, a deathstar and a bunch of sorcerrers for electroexchange. You perform a 1-st turn charge, charge up the key and now your opponent also has half his army in d terrain. Now all you need is a way to ensure the raptor's arrival. It's doable with a fortification with comms relay that you'll likely need anywayz to score the backlines with your min cultists or maybe csm with an autocannon. A well placed bunker can controle 2 points with obsec from the guyz inside.

Now that's a risky strategy but it might be fun when it goes off. Scatterless raptors will be a great source of melta. Warp talons are decently choppy vs 3+ armor.

...If you're about termies in pods, i'm not sure it's really allowed due to wording "roll on reserves" and 1-st turn pods don't roll on reserves. Anywayz, termies are still good turn 2-3.

Im not sure you'd want to come in turn one with Raptors in most games. You need some time to get your Dirge Casters up for maximum effect.

Blood Angels have the Storm Raven formation that allows them to charge turn one. Plus you get three Storm Ravens so that's pretty cool.

That formation got really gutted by the FAQ.

Martel732 wrote:
That formation got really gutted by the FAQ.

I saw nothing gutted in it. It appears to work just like I said it did to begin with.

https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MJziOtysDfo/V3U23LvER2I/AAAAAAABEqw/fGAU2bt8rBUSrl2GscmIyu9NeTKiwqJugCLcB/s1600/13497611_1640088732978426_7616278738916625067_o.jpg

Just curious, has anyone tried to combo a few renegade knights with some heretech sorcs? Or perhaps some geomortis with rapid fire battle cannons (ignores cover, no LoS needed)?

Martel732 wrote:
In my case, he can kill half my list turn one and the other half the next turn. The Tau have the firepower to get you all. I guess you've got invulns that I don't and T5. Must be nice to no longer be the worst power armor list.

If a Tau as a 100% hit rate on his hit rolls, then there is something "fishy"...

Because thats what you're describing

 Slayer le boucher wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
In my case, he can kill half my list turn one and the other half the next turn. The Tau have the firepower to get you all. I guess you've got invulns that I don't and T5. Must be nice to no longer be the worst power armor list.

If a Tau as a 100% hit rate on his hit rolls, then there is something "fishy"...

Because thats what you're describing

BA are very fragile for their points.

BA's are as though then any other MEQ, they are not more fragile then others Marines

 Slayer le boucher wrote:
BA's are as though then any other MEQ, they are not more fragile then others Marines

The Tactical Marine isn't exactly the most durable thing for the points. Also the fact they don't have offensive bite offends me.

That's the singular thing CSM does better than the Loyalist Scum: the concept of how the Tactical Marines should work.

But then you got the free transports and then suddenly they're super cheap.

Table wrote:
Just curious, has anyone tried to combo a few renegade knights with some heretech sorcs? Or perhaps some geomortis with rapid fire battle cannons (ignores cover, no LoS needed)?

I have tacitly avoided using Knights. I think they dont belong in 40K and so i refuse to perpetuate their use. Maybe I'll get over it. But in the meantime...nah.

Table wrote:
Just curious, has anyone tried to combo a few renegade knights with some heretech sorcs? Or perhaps some geomortis with rapid fire battle cannons (ignores cover, no LoS needed)?

I haven't tried it with heritech, but the problem with any list that spams AV in a few small packages is going to obviously be grav. A single centstar can down two knights a turn.
Necrons and eldar also have good answers to AV and ignore the actual values.

It should do really well against a lot of the other lists though

Akiasura wrote:

Table wrote:
Just curious, has anyone tried to combo a few renegade knights with some heretech sorcs? Or perhaps some geomortis with rapid fire battle cannons (ignores cover, no LoS needed)?

I haven't tried it with heritech, but the problem with any list that spams AV in a few small packages is going to obviously be grav. A single centstar can down two knights a turn.
Necrons and eldar also have good answers to AV and ignore the actual values.

It should do really well against a lot of the other lists though

Emmm... I'm pretty sure super-heavy walkers ignore immobilized results, rendering grav a non-issue. Then again I could be mixing things up with super heavy vehicles who DO ignore said result.

Lord Kragan wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

Table wrote:
Just curious, has anyone tried to combo a few renegade knights with some heretech sorcs? Or perhaps some geomortis with rapid fire battle cannons (ignores cover, no LoS needed)?

I haven't tried it with heritech, but the problem with any list that spams AV in a few small packages is going to obviously be grav. A single centstar can down two knights a turn.
Necrons and eldar also have good answers to AV and ignore the actual values.

It should do really well against a lot of the other lists though

Emmm... I'm pretty sure super-heavy walkers ignore immobilized results, rendering grav a non-issue. Then again I could be mixing things up with super heavy vehicles who DO ignore said result.

It's more how quickly they rip apart the HP then anything else. I usually don't even bother rolling for effects since I'm going to destroy it pretty handily.
If each cent could pick a different target, one cent squad could easily destroy 4 tanks a turn, maybe 5 with a single buff.

 Slayer le boucher wrote:

3.5Ed CSM has become such a legend that, all sorts of weird stories are floating about it.

I love the Legends of 3.5 really, I do. Because they all revolve around Iron Warriors magically gaining Heavy Support choices and Siren being autocast army wide. Apparently. Even though we know that's not true.

Even better, the people who loathed Chaos 3.5 seemed to have forgotten that the following existed at the same time.

4th ed. Trait Space Marines - Bikestars started here.
4th ed. Nidzilla or Assault Outflank Tyranids
4th ed. Tau Fish of Fury - because firing through a floating invisible wall of a tank with impunity was fun, right?
Eldar Craftworlds - Ranger Tables, Black Guardians, 3 shot AP 3 Starcannon spam everywhere.
Ork Kult of Speed.

3.5 to late 4th ed 40k was broken across the board. It wasn't just a single army. Every damn army could pull off feats of stupidity.

The big difference is that this was the first time that CSM were actually a viable threat in the meta. 2nd ed? Not too grand compared to Imperials. 3rd ed. Very bland. 4th/5th ed codex? A joke. 6th ed? BUY DINOBOTS NAOW.

Only 3.5 was anywhere near as flexible as any SM codex has been for the past 4 editions.

 DarkStarSabre wrote:

 Slayer le boucher wrote:

3.5Ed CSM has become such a legend that, all sorts of weird stories are floating about it.

I love the Legends of 3.5 really, I do. Because they all revolve around Iron Warriors magically gaining Heavy Support choices and Siren being autocast army wide. Apparently. Even though we know that's not true.

Even better, the people who loathed Chaos 3.5 seemed to have forgotten that the following existed at the same time.

4th ed. Trait Space Marines - Bikestars started here.
4th ed. Nidzilla or Assault Outflank Tyranids
4th ed. Tau Fish of Fury - because firing through a floating invisible wall of a tank with impunity was fun, right?
Eldar Craftworlds - Ranger Tables, Black Guardians, 3 shot AP 3 Starcannon spam everywhere.
Ork Kult of Speed.

3.5 to late 4th ed 40k was broken across the board. It wasn't just a single army. Every damn army could pull off feats of stupidity.

The big difference is that this was the first time that CSM were actually a viable threat in the meta. 2nd ed? Not too grand compared to Imperials. 3rd ed. Very bland. 4th/5th ed codex? A joke. 6th ed? BUY DINOBOTS NAOW.

Only 3.5 was anywhere near as flexible as any SM codex has been for the past 4 editions.

You forgot 4th edition Eldar FalconSpam

Akiasura wrote:

Lord Kragan wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

Table wrote:
Just curious, has anyone tried to combo a few renegade knights with some heretech sorcs? Or perhaps some geomortis with rapid fire battle cannons (ignores cover, no LoS needed)?

I haven't tried it with heritech, but the problem with any list that spams AV in a few small packages is going to obviously be grav. A single centstar can down two knights a turn.
Necrons and eldar also have good answers to AV and ignore the actual values.

It should do really well against a lot of the other lists though

Emmm... I'm pretty sure super-heavy walkers ignore immobilized results, rendering grav a non-issue. Then again I could be mixing things up with super heavy vehicles who DO ignore said result.

It's more how quickly they rip apart the HP then anything else. I usually don't even bother rolling for effects since I'm going to destroy it pretty handily.
If each cent could pick a different target, one cent squad could easily destroy 4 tanks a turn, maybe 5 with a single buff.

Again, that's a non-issue to knights because the grav's effect is: causes an immobilize (which is what removes the HP) result. If the knights do have inmunity to inmobilized I see no way why they should run into trouble with grav.

Grav does a HP and an Immobilized result.

That being said, 3 Centurions with Grav-Cannons will hit with an average of 10 shots, which will do around 3 HP of damage. Half a dead knight.

Lord Kragan wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

Lord Kragan wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

Table wrote:
Just curious, has anyone tried to combo a few renegade knights with some heretech sorcs? Or perhaps some geomortis with rapid fire battle cannons (ignores cover, no LoS needed)?

I haven't tried it with heritech, but the problem with any list that spams AV in a few small packages is going to obviously be grav. A single centstar can down two knights a turn.
Necrons and eldar also have good answers to AV and ignore the actual values.

It should do really well against a lot of the other lists though

Emmm... I'm pretty sure super-heavy walkers ignore immobilized results, rendering grav a non-issue. Then again I could be mixing things up with super heavy vehicles who DO ignore said result.

It's more how quickly they rip apart the HP then anything else. I usually don't even bother rolling for effects since I'm going to destroy it pretty handily.
If each cent could pick a different target, one cent squad could easily destroy 4 tanks a turn, maybe 5 with a single buff.

Again, that's a non-issue to knights because the grav's effect is: causes an immobilize (which is what removes the HP) result. If the knights do have inmunity to inmobilized I see no way why they should run into trouble with grav.

Yeah that's not correct. You remove an hp and they can possibly remove 2, but not against Knights.

Reavas wrote:

How is this new update not good news for you? We have amazing cultist formations in spades, You have a choice of re-spawning, outflanking cultists that it is better to take a lot more smaller groups, or the Crimson slaughter formation which has re-spawning 1d6 cultists which is also useful. As for elite groups why not run the chosen of Abbadon (black legion formation) It fits what you want perfectly, you can either take a chaos lord/sorcerer with a unit of chosen or chaos terminators. Bam, alpha legion, loads of cultists and a group of elite.

You know, the really funny thing is that Tyranids have access to a similar formation that gives infinitely spawning and respawning termagants and hormagaunts. Wonder why no one takes it? Oh, wait, because you are mass spamming a low toughness, virtual non-armour unit that basically just hands out free VP to whatever it comes across - someone has already worked out the maths later on against a basic tactical squad of all things.

No, no, Traitor's Hate was terrible.

Because its 'buffs' were done by further reinforcing the gak-awful rules that no one actually wanted in the first place. Like, seriously, the random boon table is the reason CSM have next to no options and are overpointed to boot - we're paying a premium for 'possible results' and not for the gak awful results we can get instead - which also can hilariously hand over VP as well. The boon table forces the mandatory challenge rule, which is god awful as a whole. Like, no, I do not want to randomly call a challenge against that Hive Tyrant with my aspiring champion. Tactically it would be more sound to not do so and use his squad as ablative wounds. But nope, guess we gotta call a challenge and hand them potential free VP as well (iirc there is a warlord trait which awards VP for killing characters).

You don't fix something by making us more reliant on the problem you stuck in.

Traitors hate was simply not terrible. Simply untrue.

And the Boon table is nice to have but uit had almost nothing to do with how we are pointed. the impactr of getting ones for free though is pretty awesome.

Path to Glory Boons Table is rather nice.

It gots a simplier and down to essential Boons, and Boons for each Gods, and not to forget Boons that can be used Once per games by units, and they are pretty nice all of them.

 Jancoran wrote:
Traitors hate was simply not terrible. Simply untrue.

And the Boon table is nice to have but uit had almost nothing to do with how we are pointed. the impactr of getting ones for free though is pretty awesome.

Yeah, like getting things you already have or worse losing everything you have on your kitted out lord, when it worked it was okay but the problem is too much of its either redundant, or worse just straight up useless to you despite being forced into challenges.

The problem with the forced mechanic is that it seems like a holdover when they were making the Fantasy version, where Warriors of Chaos are infact bigger, and badder then most things that one could imagine from normal humans. If the standard human profile prevailed in 40k (S3/T3/I3) then being stronger then the rest would actually be a boon for having a painful forced mechanic. The problem is CSM does not have that sort of leeway in 40k where they are infact just on par with most of the common races, their Chaos Lords are actually only comparable to Captains while Chapter Masters and the like are even stronger, with more and more better CC lords coming out daily.

What I'd like to see however is a changeup, Aspiring Champions are no longer just CSM +1A, but are actually full on powerhouses to themselves, Give them a stronger statline where they actually could represent someone becoming a Lords second or third in command, 2 wounds, I5, WS5, A3 and the like, swap them up from the normal SM sarge's a bit to show that these are people who at a moments notice could become the new Chaos Lord after their boss suddenly kicks the bucket, maybe even let them buy ML1.

Though I'd also like to see the Challenge Mechanic gone, since it's unfluffy for most. I mostly just want buyable 'mutations' from the older books back rather then the random it's become, if it must stay.. Well why not let you buy options from it? Coldar The Frost Hearted got his mutation in an early conflict and comes in freezing everyone for an X cost. Heck if they want to push it further, they can instead make it so that mutations can upgrade if you get it again, already have the Flesh Metal mutation? Well guess what, now your spawning weapons from your own body like an obliterator/mutilator! So many things one could do with it to make it interesting I suppose.

CSM aspiring champs need +1 wound.

Maybe they put the forced challenge mechanic in because they were afraid that the boon table was so bad people might actively avoid challenges so they wouldn't have to roll on it? And also to make sure your Chaos Lord wouldn't not die cinematically in heroic single combat with Chapter Master Smashfether.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 koooaei wrote:
CSM aspiring champs need +1 wound.

Will never happen unless SM sergeants get it too. The First Law of Chaos is that CSM must always be strictly worse than the SM counterpart where one exists.

Eldar get that along with BS/WS5 and cool equipment because reasons

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Eldar get that along with BS/WS5 and cool equipment because reasons

Eldar are not intentionally designed to lose against SM.

 koooaei wrote:
CSM aspiring champs need +1 wound.

Exarchs of all things got two wounds.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Abadabadoobaddon wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Eldar get that along with BS/WS5 and cool equipment because reasons

Eldar are not intentionally designed to lose against SM.

Nor are Chaos Space Marines.