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True, they don't have any option to be taken as troops. (But their formation ain't that bad, so...)

Overall, though, Plague Marines could use a points drop/Praetorians a points hike.

 JNAProductions wrote:
True, they don't have any option to be taken as troops. (But their formation ain't that bad, so...)

Overall, though, Plague Marines could use a points drop/Praetorians a points hike.

Praetorians are fine at their price point, making them any higher would make them go poof from any lists. It's not like they're taking the tournament world by storm in any means.

Unfortunately, GW's holdover of cult marines as troops has made them underperform as elite units since making them too strong would make normal CSM pointless. They really have to make sure they each have a distinct niche they fill and go full ham on that and ignore the troops aspect now that formations are a thing. Noise Marines should be about their sonic weaponry (surprised they don't come with their guns base which really should have dual profile options like the blast master: one salvo, the other assault), Berserkers need to have their CC oomph back again rather than be slightly more skilled CSM (give them gladiatorial weapons or widespread access to PW like Death Company amongst other things like 2 base attacks), Plague Marines need to double down on resilience with other poison effects and Thousands Sons are already getting more weapons options and likely psychic powers for their sorcerers. They effectively need to FEEL like actual elites.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Combat Squads really isn't a big bonus.

With combat squads you get.

-The ability to avoid having to snap shoot Heavy Weapons.

-The ability to place Heavy Weapons in safer areas.

-The ability to hold two objectives with one squad.

-The ability to minimize overkill vs certain units.

-The ability to minimize ineffective fire. (Being forced to shoot bolters at AV11+)

You're totally right not an advantage at all. I mean how much of a difference is hitting on 6+ to hitting on 3+, and how important is it to have your more expensive modals in a semi-safe area where they can stay alive for most the game. Holding objectives is almost useless. When I think an effective use of fire I think shooting an autocannon a plasma gun and 4 bolters at a single TM, or shooting 8 bolters at a fething rhino.

 Thousand-Son-Sorcerer wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Combat Squads really isn't a big bonus.

With combat squads you get.

-The ability to avoid having to snap shoot Heavy Weapons.

-The ability to place Heavy Weapons in safer areas.

-The ability to hold two objectives with one squad.

-The ability to minimize overkill vs certain units.

-The ability to minimize ineffective fire. (Being forced to shoot bolters at AV11+)

You're totally right not an advantage at all. I mean how much of a difference is hitting on 6+ to hitting on 3+, and how important is it to have your more expensive modals in a semi-safe area where they can stay alive for most the game. Holding objectives is almost useless. When I think an effective use of fire I think shooting an autocannon a plasma gun and 4 bolters at a single TM, or shooting 8 bolters at a fething rhino.

You're wasting your breath unfortunately, none of the loyalist players even know what heavy weapons that aren't a grav cannon do anymore.

 Drasius wrote:
You're wasting your breath unfortunately, none of the loyalist players even know what heavy weapons that aren't a grav cannon do anymore.

Yeah I know. It be nice if they would say "you're right, all of our gak is better then yours, and less expensive, and that needs to change."

 Thousand-Son-Sorcerer wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Combat Squads really isn't a big bonus.

With combat squads you get.

-The ability to avoid having to snap shoot Heavy Weapons.

-The ability to place Heavy Weapons in safer areas.

-The ability to hold two objectives with one squad.

-The ability to minimize overkill vs certain units.

-The ability to minimize ineffective fire. (Being forced to shoot bolters at AV11+)

You're totally right not an advantage at all. I mean how much of a difference is hitting on 6+ to hitting on 3+, and how important is it to have your more expensive modals in a semi-safe area where they can stay alive for most the game. Holding objectives is almost useless. When I think an effective use of fire I think shooting an autocannon a plasma gun and 4 bolters at a single TM, or shooting 8 bolters at a fething rhino.

1. Or you just get 5 man squads in the first place. If you're using 10 man squads you'd much rather have the two Special Weapons.
2. What overkill?
3. Once again this is attributed to just taking 5 man squads.

The rule has literally two uses I've found in even a remotely okay manner.
1.Skyhammer to pin more units
2. Carcharodon Tactical Marines, half with just the CCW's and Melta and Combi-Melta, and then the other half with Bolters and Grav Cannon and squad right after the drop.

 MagicJuggler wrote:
a 3++ saves versus stuff like Grav/Rending

Spawns allready don't care about grav/rending.

There's just not much you're getting out of MoT. Yep, your character becomes somewhat better vs high st low ap non-s10 shooting. But than he's forced to stick with unmarked guyz. The best option here is probably cultists + a bunch of sorcs to make them invisible and soulswap them left and right. But than you're too short on points to actually take this tzeench lord cause you're allready running 5 sorcs, Kharn to kill stuff and probably Cypher or Huron/Ahriman. Lord doesn't need a to of durability in this setup. Heck, you don't need lord in this setup.

Whereas Nurgle lord is free to join nurgle spawns - the best unit in the dex - and has def nades. A khornelord is free to join kdk khornedogs and has AoBF - another wonderful option. Slaanesh lord is free to go please himself.

So, MoT can be neat for a character as you can make a fairly resilient fairly choppy lord - but than MoN and MoK are just better overall.

I agree MoN is the go-to Mark for a Lord just because Toughness 6, but I'm also finding that there are enough threats out there that don't care about toughness, where I would rather have the 3++ and in the off-chance I feel like using Sinistrum, a 3++ reroll is cute). I imagine taking the Skull of Eternal Warrior could also be an option, if points are something you don't care too much about.

I use a Tzeentch Lord as much for the fun of it as much as the utility. He's a Jetbike. Granted, Chaos doesn't get Jetbike units so the problem with a Disc is he doesn't get an ideal escort to work with. However, I find I like to split off my ICs from their units anyway/play "solo"-MSUhammer, and a T5 Obsec Jetbike has its uses, while being able to bully choice units and ignoring intervening screening chaff.

On the fun-not as competitive side, I like the Scrolls of Magnus. Call me paranoid but the fact you can't take more than one Sorcerer in a Warband means I am leery about adding the 2nd Sorcerer as a Command Choice, since it wouldn't get Favored Scions. That ability is as much insurance against an inopportune transform as much as it is letting me get Moar powers. And my rationale is that 4 of the 5 Primaris powers from Scrolls are worth getting (even Smite becomes somewhat attractive when you're BS 5 instead of 4), and the potential for stuff like Warp Speed, Iron Arm, etc, is always appreciated.

PS: Unless GW FAQ'd it (which somehow I doubt), there's nothing preventing an IC with a Mark from joining a unit with "Daemon of" another alignment, or vice-versa. So technically, there's nothing preventing a Sorcerer of Slaanesh from joining a unit of Flesh Hounds to grant them Acute Senses, or nothing preventing a Herald of Khorne from joining a unit of Nurgle Obliterators to grant them Blood For The Blood God.

I haven't used the combat squad rule since before 5th ed. It's useless. Non-grav heavy weapons in tac squads are also useless, which is a big reason combat squads is useless. Although the real reason is 5 man squads maximize Rhino saturation and minimizes how many models get stranded when a Rhino is knocked out.

Mark the day! I agree with Martel732

Combat Squad, while free for C:SM, is a pointless arguement for why C:SM are better than CSM. I understand ATSKNF being busted af for 1pt (as well as CT on top of it). But please stop bringing up Combat Squads. Any competitive aspect of 40k will laugh at you if you roll up with 10man Tacticals only to Combat Squad them. Sorry for being blunt. Haha.

Combat Squads + Formation Bonuses + Meta-detachment bonuses. While universal Ld 10 is nice, and free Chaos boons are cute, the advantages are generally more localized and don't scale as well at higher point-value games.

For example, a Fist of Medusa Force can run a Stormlance Demi-Company. In exchange for costing one point more than vanilla Chaos Marines, and not getting Obsec, the Loyalists get:
>All vehicles within 12" of an IC get POTMS
>All vehicles and Characters get IWND
>All models get +1 to FNP, or +2 if within 12" of an IC. A Bike Command Squad escorting a Captain has 3+ FNP.

The core formation now gets:
>Reroll to-hit units that control objectives. (Vehicles get this too, so the Lascannon on Lasplas Razorbacks could get rerolls too)
>Move-After-Fire, for Bikes/Infantry/Transports. Infantry can re-embark after firing.

If "Path to Glory" allowed multiple Boons based on how many HQs you took (1 roll, plus 1 for every HQ choice in this detachment), or there were more bonuses allowing HQs/Champs to take free Wargear upgrades, I could see running all 1850 points in this detachment. As is, I put about 1450-something points in the Warband/Spawn, and add Daemon allies.

Saythings wrote:
Mark the day! I agree with Martel732

Combat Squad, while free for C:SM, is a pointless arguement for why C:SM are better than CSM. I understand ATSKNF being busted af for 1pt (as well as CT on top of it). But please stop bringing up Combat Squads. Any competitive aspect of 40k will laugh at you if you roll up with 10man Tacticals only to Combat Squad them. Sorry for being blunt. Haha.

I didn't know we disagreed so much.

Frankly, I'm finding ATSKNF to not be so useful anymore either. Living to get the assault off is the single biggest challenge. That's really the problem with CSM. The raptor assault from DS thing is pretty good though.

I think CSM compare very favorably to BA at this point. There are very, very specific things about vanilla loyalists that put them over the top. Like say an entire army of hit and run. And neither CSM nor BA have any of them.

I pretty much agree with most of what Martel is saying. Several of the TH formations gave a major lifeline to Chaos to the point I'd argue they're very much a "middle of the road" army, and as long as it's not something like a Blue Scars Battle Company, or Medusa Stormlance or certain Bike/Wolf builds, they're not too far off from Vanilla Marines.

CAD-to-CAD, Chaos has its issues but this isn't as much about granular differences between Tacticals and CSM, or other analogues, as much as it is the Chaos FOC being more "monorole" ("All long-range shooting is in Heavy Support. All fast units are in Fast Attack"), and not getting stuff like Bike Troops or analogues for Attack Bikes, Razorbacks, or Rifledreads within their respective FOC slots.

Some of this can be worked around through other means (Daemon/Necron allies, Psychic support, etc), but out-of-the-box, the Chaos toolbox is more limited and you have to resort to increasingly gamey shenanigans.

The reason ATSKNF is so good is because (short of falling back and running off the board) it's better than fearless. It also forces enemies to kill all 5 marines.

I'll elaborate - Fearless models have to be killed down to the man to remove them of objectives/Linebreaker, etc.

Both Fearless and ATSKNF models both can't be swept. However, it does allow marines pseudo-HnR if they fail their morale. Also, it also opens up "Our Weapons are Useless" options to try to get out of combats with some Super Heavies.

This allows some opportunities of shooting that Fearless models never get the chance (window of opportunity) to have.

This allows marines to Go-To-Ground take the +1 cover, fail a morale check, get up off the ground, and act normally the following turn. Fearless don't get this option.

I would argue - and some might disagree - that ATSKNF is even better than Fearless as it allows more options/opportunities. None of which are reliable but every "down side" to not have fearless vs ATSKNF is viewed as a benefit to me.

Short of end game objective control - getting shot at, failing a LD8, and falling back on the VERY last turn (with time restrictions being a factor) - ATSKNF is better than Fearless.

If the game does go on, they get to act normally, hop back on the objective, and get a turn of shooting/assaulting again.

I recently had a discussion at a local about ATSKNF being better than fearless. I'm sure there are some points that I've forgetting - let me know! IMO - ATSKNF has all the benefits of being fearless with none of the drawbacks - (Short of failing that LD8 on the last round of the game while holding an objective).

Saythings wrote:
ATSKNF is better than fearless

It's slightly better, but both are SO much better than nothing, and most of CSM has nothing. C:SM get ATSKNF blanket on everything while CSM pay a point and slot premium for models that have fearless.

 MagicJuggler wrote:
I agree MoN is the go-to Mark for a Lord just because Toughness 6, but I'm also finding that there are enough threats out there that don't care about toughness, where I would rather have the 3++ and in the off-chance I feel like using Sinistrum, a 3++ reroll is cute). I imagine taking the Skull of Eternal Warrior could also be an option, if points are something you don't care too much about.

I use a Tzeentch Lord as much for the fun of it as much as the utility. He's a Jetbike. Granted, Chaos doesn't get Jetbike units so the problem with a Disc is he doesn't get an ideal escort to work with. However, I find I like to split off my ICs from their units anyway/play "solo"-MSUhammer, and a T5 Obsec Jetbike has its uses, while being able to bully choice units and ignoring intervening screening chaff.

On the fun-not as competitive side, I like the Scrolls of Magnus. Call me paranoid but the fact you can't take more than one Sorcerer in a Warband means I am leery about adding the 2nd Sorcerer as a Command Choice, since it wouldn't get Favored Scions. That ability is as much insurance against an inopportune transform as much as it is letting me get Moar powers. And my rationale is that 4 of the 5 Primaris powers from Scrolls are worth getting (even Smite becomes somewhat attractive when you're BS 5 instead of 4), and the potential for stuff like Warp Speed, Iron Arm, etc, is always appreciated.

PS: Unless GW FAQ'd it (which somehow I doubt), there's nothing preventing an IC with a Mark from joining a unit with "Daemon of" another alignment, or vice-versa. So technically, there's nothing preventing a Sorcerer of Slaanesh from joining a unit of Flesh Hounds to grant them Acute Senses, or nothing preventing a Herald of Khorne from joining a unit of Nurgle Obliterators to grant them Blood For The Blood God.

Some interesting points, really. Especially the scrollsof Magnus! I'm bound to run it on a lord now. Granted i prefer to buff him first, it's no long till he gets something like fnp or +1 wound.

You can't join Daemons of any alignment unless you're of the same alignment. (Unless they're Fearless rather than Daemonically Unstable, so KDK only.)

I meant KDK specifically, which is why I used the example of a Khorne Herald for purposes of granting Blood for the Blood God. I've contemplated a Gorepack as a hypothetical formation for certain Fiendspam lists, simply so I could Outflank the Warpsmith tax, but I remember how Outflank could be defeated in 5e by lining a table edge, so I'm leery about Outflank that doesn't come on a Tank or Skimmer/Jetbike.

IMO Combat Squads is super useful, since you can drop two units out of a single Drop Pod. Also you can reorganize your fighting units at the beginning of every game.

ATSKNF is also still a huge boost. Can't be run down, regroup automatically, move and fire at full effect or assault after regrouping.


IMO Chaos Marines are better used as cheaper supporting units, or as Character reinforced "attack blobs". With Traitors Hate, I'd be looking to make big squads shielding nasty characters, and moved across the table with spells. I'm really curious to see how the Legions book turns out. There might be some really good opportunities with that.

I'd rather drop two squads of five.

Especially when they are 2 free drop pods for the same points. HAHA... oh GW.

You can't get primaris powers form the scrolls. They specifically state:".. you cannot swap to the primaris power.."

Saythings wrote:
Especially when they are 2 free drop pods for the same points. HAHA... oh GW.

Well, BA can't do that, but still.

 Roknar wrote:
You can't get primaris powers form the scrolls. They specifically state:".. you cannot swap to the primaris power.."

Psychic Focus and Chaos Psychic Focus stack.

Martel732 wrote:

Saythings wrote:
Especially when they are 2 free drop pods for the same points. HAHA... oh GW.

Well, BA can't do that, but still.

For sure, OP was comparing Codex SM though

Martel732 wrote:
I'd rather drop two squads of five.

In a Battle Company with free Transports, sure. In any other setup you're saving 35 points and getting more marines on the table faster since you are only getting half your pods on the first turn. You drop either the padding with min squads, or the meat with more Marines per Pod for weight of numbers. 10 man Melta, Combi-Melta, Grav Cannon.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I'd rather drop two squads of five.

In a Battle Company with free Transports, sure. In any other setup you're saving 35 points and getting more marines on the table faster since you are only getting half your pods on the first turn. You drop either the padding with min squads, or the meat with more Marines per Pod for weight of numbers. 10 man Melta, Combi-Melta, Grav Cannon.

I'd rather have the pods to get more locator beacons on the table. I'm never going to put 10 men in a pod.

And I've never used a Locator Beacon. To each their own.

I suppose, but i'm still going with combat squads as a non- advantage.

 MagicJuggler wrote:

 Roknar wrote:
You can't get primaris powers form the scrolls. They specifically state:".. you cannot swap to the primaris power.."

Psychic Focus and Chaos Psychic Focus stack.

I suppose so, but to keep psychic focus you would have to either not gain new powers or pray real hard you roll on the same discipline again.
At 45 points it would be quite a waste not to get more powers imho, unless you get super lucky and get a power you plan on casting every turn.
There's a slim chance to stay in the same discipline and gaining a new spell from a different discipline will cause you to loose psychic focus and with it, the primaris.

Plus the good primaris' don't use the increased BS. If you could choose a discipline and then roll it would be more interesting, but it's just a bit too random for my tastes.