Cephalobeard wrote:
CSM kind of suck in 8th. I'd highly recommend cultists instead, if you have that option.

Champion of Slaanesh wrote:

 Cephalobeard wrote:
CSM kind of suck in 8th. I'd highly recommend cultists instead, if you have that option.

I do but it feels wrong to take cultists as my only troops in a csm army

 lindsay40k wrote:

Champion of Slaanesh wrote:

 Cephalobeard wrote:
CSM kind of suck in 8th. I'd highly recommend cultists instead, if you have that option.

I do but it feels wrong to take cultists as my only troops in a csm army

Well, if it helps:

- we are supposed to be 10,000 year veterans and we've spent that (accelerated) time in a Petri dish full of empyrean forces and Cannon-fodder waiting to be press-ganged or converted, if most of our soldiers are Chosen or Elite Cult or Possessed then that's because they've survived plenty of battles by making the pawns go first;

- corpse-lover tactical squads have two weapon specialists because that fool Guilliman said so, there's no Codex Astartes telling us to take our plasma tactical and heavy support Squads that worked perfectly well in the Heresy and split them off

- there's nothing saying you can't take one or two Heretac squads but adding a load of Cultists will definitely help, especially if you face an opponent with some throwaway Scions who can nuke your Rhinos turn one and leave your Zerks to foot-slog it at a gunline

BillyN831 wrote:
In a rhino with 9 Khorne Berserkers. My other rhino has an exalted champion with 9 Khorne Berserkers.

 lindsay40k wrote:
@Chephalobeard - exactly. Until recently, BL had Chosen and Terminators as Troops, I thought it was a bit of a fluff leap to make them CSM specialists tbh (especially with no proper Dark Apothecary to recruit them). NL had Raptors for Troops, IW had Obliterators (!), and we know about WBs - none of the Legions have a pressing need to field a Heretac backbone to look right.

That leaves Renegades, whom I'm sure after centuries of protecting non-super humans will generally be agreeable to the idea of letting them be the ones getting bored standing on objective and getting shot leading the advance.

 techsoldaten wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
I'm speaking as a competitive player warning newer players why this strategy is bad.
1. It's Battleshock from AoS basically. I prefer it as a shorthand for Morale Tests. Much quicker to type.
Also I don't know where you're getting Ld10 from, but it isn't hard losing models to it. Necron players aren't doing Warrior squads over 10-15 for a reason and they're LD10.
Also if you read, I said you don't get the Lascannons if you advance. For a 300 point unit, you can't afford to advance for a single turn and lose Lascannon usage because you need the rest of the unit in range for the Bolters that'll never fire relevantly.
2. It isn't so I don't know what your point is?
3. I'm saying they can't move much. You have a 300 point unit that can't get anywhere. It's 2 Lascannons and 18 Bolters (19 if you spring for a Combi-Bolter). Maybe 5-10 of those will hit anything, and then the rest sit there. All it takes is one melee unit to put it out of commission. Nobody is afraid of a 20 man Marine squad in melee! You'll have to be forced to fall back because you need those Lascannons firing, and they aren't gonna overwhelm anybody. It's unwieldy and bad.
4. Anybody Deep Striking for melee is going to have a way to reroll unless they like to live dangerously, which is then a 48% (look at Asterion, Shrike, and Black Templars as Loyalist examples, Raptors w/ Khorne Icons and infiltrated Icon Berserker Marines for Chaos, there's a few good examples), and the Overwatch is not dangerous. 36 Bolter shots in Overwatch is one dead Marine. One. The Lascannons inflict less than 0.2 deaths. So if your opponent is incapable of math, yeah there's Overwatch. There's also not caring about Overwatch. The latter is what you're going for, definitely.

Also Alpha Legion has the better survivability trait. Morale checks don't matter if you don't have to make them. With lower squad numbers that's not a worry for Alpha Legion. I have no idea why you'd ever suggest that, ever. Black Legion has easily the worst trait in the book and are the equivalent of Iron Hands for the Loyalists, except you get access to what is actually a pretty great character. Still not worth bothering with though.

You're also proposing the squad in your scenario is ever in Rapid Fire range. It won't be because it can't move anywhere efficiently.

Yeah, I might have overstated a couple of points. Happy to clarify.

Since you are a competitive player, I ask you to remember the original comparison from earlier in the thread: a 10x man NM squad vs a 20x man BL CSM squad. I'm sure you have some other ideas in mind, but I have been arguing this selection.

1) You're right, it's Ld9 on BL CSM squads. i sometimes get Ld10 when they have a Dark Apostle near them.

1.1) Then don't advance, or only advance with one squad. I do fine marching across the table. Advancing and shooting is a nice to have that doesn't get used each turn.

2) My point is Noise Marines have less wounds and the game does not stop the round they get out of a Rhino. What I think you are arguing is the added mobility the NMs gain from Rhino gives them some advantage and I am saying that rarely works out in practice.

In general, my NMs are disembarking turn 2 because a) something is in range and b) I don't want the Rhino destroyed and the occupants shot up before they get a chance to shoot. So the Rhino has moved at 18 inches (12 inch movement + advance) and the Noise Marines have moved another 9 (3 inch disembark + 6 inch movement.)

That's 15 inches further than the CSMs could move by turn 2 without advancing. But now the Noise Marines are in 24 inches of the opponent, without a screen, and without an HQ with an aura. They are going to have a great turn of shooting, then take a lot of wounds because they are a priority target.

Before I go on, do you want to explain what you are doing to keep that from happening? Because being out in front has generally not worked for me in many games. I was finding the only reason I was using the Rhinos was to shield NMs from first-turn shooting and mobility didn't mean much.

3) Those 300 point CSM squads move far enough to take objectives, which is typically where I want them.

4) Sure. Forgetting the reroll shenanigans are once per turn for most armies, let's say whoever is deep striking makes it. Go ahead and charge a 20 man BL CSM squad standing next to Abaddon & an Exalted Champion. Make sure you set up to do at least 15 wounds against MEQ because Overwatch with rerolls + DttFE is a lot more potent than you claim, close combat is lethal, and Abaddon is going to charge the next turn.

With regards to Alpha Legion, sure, they take 16% fewer hits because of the Legion Trait. That's quite an advantage.

The reason people play Black Legion is to reroll all misses to hit because of Abaddon. I have not taken the time to do much math around this but I am happy with the offensive bonuses.

What kills the Noise Marines in a Rhino is Abaddon. It's very hard for NMs to benefit from him when they are in a Rhino, and they suffer the same problems you describe when they are not. If you deploy Abaddon with the rest of your army, he's going to be 15 inches behind the Noise Marines by turn 2. If you deploy him from Deep Strike, he won't be buffing your army turn one and there's a very good chance he will be in the open by turn 3 once the NMs have gone down.

Maybe it's a Black Legion thing or a matched play thing, but I don't see how standing up a unit with half the wounds way in front of the rest of your army is better than a slower moving force with double the wounds.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Does Death To The False Emperor work on Overwatch? I thought it was only the Fight phase, not the Charge phase.

 Vomikron Noxis wrote:
Those of you taking exalted champions, how are you equipping them?

 JNAProductions wrote:
Does Death To The False Emperor work on Overwatch? I thought it was only the Fight phase, not the Charge phase.

 VyRa wrote:

 Vomikron Noxis wrote:
Those of you taking exalted champions, how are you equipping them?

Preferably cheap. Usually a second chainsword or a chainaxe. A power sword if i have points to waste. My reasoning behind this being, that their lack of a SOC lets them die rather quickly, so i try to keep them as far as possible from the enemy and let aspire to glory do all the hard lifting for me.

 Vomikron Noxis wrote:
Those of you taking exalted champions, how are you equipping them?Although I was thinking of moving the power fists from my berserker champions onto the exalted champions to get more mileage for the 12 points. Then running the zerker champs with sword and axe instead.

Could drop the power fists altogether but for 12 points...

 VyRa wrote:

 Vomikron Noxis wrote:
Those of you taking exalted champions, how are you equipping them?Although I was thinking of moving the power fists from my berserker champions onto the exalted champions to get more mileage for the 12 points. Then running the zerker champs with sword and axe instead.

Certainly, but consider that the enemy can target the EC as an independent character, unlike the berzerker champion. So in my experience, the berzerker champion usually lasts longer in one on one combat, at least against targets with anti-tank weapons like dreadnoughts or thunder hammers. In the end it depends on the kind of army that you're facing, but i would always keep the fist on the zerker champ.

Could drop the power fists altogether but for 12 points...

It's usually not worth it if you're facing huge blobs of infantry with T3. On any other occasion the power fist is worth their points against heavy infantry, characters or vehicles. Unless you can switch them out for an artifact like the Hydra Blade or the Dark Crozius.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Yeah, the way you wrote it, it seemed like you were saying DttFE procced on Overwatch.

But let's see... 20 Marines with 2(? Right?) Lascannons expect to do (assuming everyone is in rapid fire range, which they probably are) 11 bolter hits and .61 Las hits, for 5.5 and .51 wounds, for 1.83 and .42 dead marines, or 2.25 total.

Assume a 10 man BT Assault Marine squad, you're left with usually 8 of them alive. That's 17 swings, for 11.33 hits, 5.67 wounds, and 1.89 dead Marines. So yeah, they're boned, especially if Abby charges in. But all they need to do is survive to make that squad useless. Can they?

21 attacks, hitting on 3s and proccing DttFE on a 5+, rerolling hits (right?). 14 hits initially, with 7 extra attacks and 7 misses. 7 misses become 2.33 more hits and 2.33 more DttFE hits, for 9.33 extra attacks. 8.29 extra hits from DttFE, for 24.62 hits. That becomes 12.31 wounds, and 4.1 dead Assault Marines.

They lost 6 dudes, leaving them at 4. Morale wipes the squad on a 6, so they've got a 2.78% chance of dying.

Or, in other words, a 97.22% chance of making that squad useless for a turn. They won't last long after this, but they did their job.

 Vomikron Noxis wrote:

 VyRa wrote:

 Vomikron Noxis wrote:
Those of you taking exalted champions, how are you equipping them?Although I was thinking of moving the power fists from my berserker champions onto the exalted champions to get more mileage for the 12 points. Then running the zerker champs with sword and axe instead.

Certainly, but consider that the enemy can target the EC as an independent character, unlike the berzerker champion. So in my experience, the berzerker champion usually lasts longer in one on one combat, at least against targets with anti-tank weapons like dreadnoughts or thunder hammers. In the end it depends on the kind of army that you're facing, but i would always keep the fist on the zerker champ.

Could drop the power fists altogether but for 12 points...

It's usually not worth it if you're facing huge blobs of infantry with T3. On any other occasion the power fist is worth their points against heavy infantry, characters or vehicles. Unless you can switch them out for an artifact like the Hydra Blade or the Dark Crozius.

Actually a very good point... I’ll keep the EC cheap for the rerolls then.

One last thing, I’m currently planning on having an EC and DA in each zerker squad (3), overkill perhaps?

jcd386 wrote:
Another thing to keep in mind about the Exalted Champ is that if noise marines near him die in the fight phase, they get to re-roll the wounds of the death throw shots, as well as getting more attacks if they roll a 6+ (which the icon improves).

 Cephalobeard wrote:

 lindsay40k wrote:

Champion of Slaanesh wrote:

 Cephalobeard wrote:
CSM kind of suck in 8th. I'd highly recommend cultists instead, if you have that option.

I do but it feels wrong to take cultists as my only troops in a csm army

Well, if it helps:

- we are supposed to be 10,000 year veterans and we've spent that (accelerated) time in a Petri dish full of empyrean forces and Cannon-fodder waiting to be press-ganged or converted, if most of our soldiers are Chosen or Elite Cult or Possessed then that's because they've survived plenty of battles by making the pawns go first;

- corpse-lover tactical squads have two weapon specialists because that fool Guilliman said so, there's no Codex Astartes telling us to take our plasma tactical and heavy support Squads that worked perfectly well in the Heresy and split them off

- there's nothing saying you can't take one or two Heretac squads but adding a load of Cultists will definitely help, especially if you face an opponent with some throwaway Scions who can nuke your Rhinos turn one and leave your Zerks to foot-slog it at a gunline

The first point is a huge one, for me.

As Alpha Legion, my cultists I don't view as a part of my Legion. They're menials I've tricked or recruited to follow orders, whether that one it or not. My Berzerkers, Noise Marines, etc are all my hyper specialized, efficient veterans of subterfuge and espionage.

Also, from a competitive standpoint, it's infinitely more efficient. Lol

 lindsay40k wrote:

 Vomikron Noxis wrote:

 VyRa wrote:

 Vomikron Noxis wrote:
Those of you taking exalted champions, how are you equipping them?Although I was thinking of moving the power fists from my berserker champions onto the exalted champions to get more mileage for the 12 points. Then running the zerker champs with sword and axe instead.

Certainly, but consider that the enemy can target the EC as an independent character, unlike the berzerker champion. So in my experience, the berzerker champion usually lasts longer in one on one combat, at least against targets with anti-tank weapons like dreadnoughts or thunder hammers. In the end it depends on the kind of army that you're facing, but i would always keep the fist on the zerker champ.

Could drop the power fists altogether but for 12 points...

It's usually not worth it if you're facing huge blobs of infantry with T3. On any other occasion the power fist is worth their points against heavy infantry, characters or vehicles. Unless you can switch them out for an artifact like the Hydra Blade or the Dark Crozius.

Actually a very good point... I’ll keep the EC cheap for the rerolls then.

One last thing, I’m currently planning on having an EC and DA in each zerker squad (3), overkill perhaps?

Three ECs, three DAs, three medium zerks, and three Rhinos... that costs about the same as half as many characters and an extra mech zerk squad. Definitely overkill!