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tneva82 wrote:

And as for painting up Guillimann...What does that matter? If you prefer say imperial fist colour scheme you can paint Guillimann like that as well.

Because fluff is a thing and some of us care about it. What the feth is this Imperial Fists Guilliman supposed to be?

You can counts-as most marine characters, as ultimately they're just marines with some gear and fighting style, and there could easily be other individuals with similar gear and tactics. You cannot do that with Guilliman, unless you're completely rewriting the fluff and say that Dorn has returned or Cawl now has ability to clone Primarchs something. (Not that I'd really oppose people doing that, the official fluff has gone to hell in in a handbasked anyway.)

 Crimson wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

And as for painting up Guillimann...What does that matter? If you prefer say imperial fist colour scheme you can paint Guillimann like that as well.

Because fluff is a thing and some of us care about it. What the feth is this Imperial Fists Guilliman supposed to be?

You can counts-as most marine characters, as ultimately they're just marines with some gear and fighting style, and there could easily be other individuals with similar gear and tactics. You cannot do that with Guilliman, unless you're completely rewriting the fluff and say that Dorn has returned or Cawl now has ability to clone Primarchs something. (Not that I'd really oppose people doing that, the official fluff has gone to hell in in a handbasked anyway.)

Yes and that's up to you. Wouldn't play it like that myself but don't expect others to follow same idea as I. It's legal and as it is 40k doesn't even have official WYSIWYG requirement let alone paint job requirements!

So it's up to what player wants. So if he wants Guillimann painted in Alpha Legion colours then that's up to him.

tneva82 wrote:


Yes and that's up to you. Wouldn't play it like that myself but don't expect others to follow same idea as I. It's legal and as it is 40k doesn't even have official WYSIWYG requirement let alone paint job requirements!

So it's up to what player wants. So if he wants Guillimann painted in Alpha Legion colours then that's up to him.

Yes, but the whole original point was that some people don't want to use Guilliman for very good reasons*, and thus it sucks that he is the linchpin of any remotely competitive marine list.

(*For example many fluff minded players do not want butcher the fluff to include additional Primarchs and if they don't want to field 'actual' Guilliman (in-fluff sens) they they're fethed.)

The argument that "just paint your guys like X and just say they're Y" doesn't change the fact that X is bad.

If I want to play X, I should be able to play X just as well as Y.

Otherwise, you may as well say "Well, I know Tau are bad, but what if you take your Tau models and play them as Eldar instead?"
Tau are still bad.

Some people don't just want to play the same list everyone else does, with the same <Chapter> and suchlike. Not all Ultramarine players want to take Guilliman, Razorbacks and Stormravens. Not all Raven Guard players want to take Helblasters. Not all Artilley-guard players want to be Catachans or Cadians.

I get that most warbands are mix'n'match these days.

I was talking about rules that are explicitly for Alpha Legion. Possibly warbands that fight like them, that's an argument I think I'd agree with.

But we're still talking about Berzerkers. Infiltrating. Berzerkers. The dedication and frenzy required to not just be a CC-focused CSM, but be a true Berzerker, could be present in guys from Alpha Legion, or who fight on the side of guys from Alpha Legion (or those who learned from them). But, fluffwise, there is *no way* Berzerkers are as quiet and sneaky as Alpha Legion or Raven Guard Marines.

And that's before discussing Rubrics. Sure, AL Marines could become Zerkers or Plague Marines. But not Rubrics. Every single Rubric was a Thousand Sons marine. And that's not some minor fluff point. Fighting on the same side, yes. Fighting in the same style? A stretch. But being Alpha Legion? Or some descendant? No.

So having an 'Alpha Legion' of any Cult Troop you want be part of the same army as AL? Sure. Same detatchment? Getting a little beardy. Using the Trait? Strained. Infiltrating? Outright bonkers.

All that is per fluff, not rules or balance.

(Although the AL trait and strat suddenly becomes much more balanced if you were to exclude those dedicated to other gods.)

I agree that saying 'Just play UM' is bad. I just don't see how it's worse than saying 'Just play AL' or 'Just play Alaitoc'.

Voss wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

Yeah exactly - chaos mixing alignments is actually expected and it's always been that way.

For a value of 'always' that ignores the legion and god specific lists that introduced the current iteration of chaos armies to the world, and the books that included them.

So perhaps 'post 3rd edition retcon' is more accurate?

Nothing has ever prevented you from taking berserkers and Plague marines in the same army. Has it? It's never even been uncool to have an unaligned faction.

But nothing has allowed them to be taken as 'Alpha Legion' specifically before, has it? Or at least not recently.

Although Voss is talking about 2nd/3rd ed changes - before my time.

Bharring wrote:
But nothing has allowed them to be taken as 'Alpha Legion' specifically before, has it? Or at least not recently.

Although Voss is talking about 2nd/3rd ed changes - before my time.

Alpha legion/Iron warriors/Black legion/Night Lords - they have all always had access to the entire CSM codex as far as I know. Berserkers have always just been an elite choice. It's not like daemonkin who only have access to khorne stuff. If they come out with Daemonkin as a codex and it's better to play bezerkers as alpha legion CSM you will have a point but right now I am just not following.

What are you talking about?

There were no rules to make a force Alpha Legion until the most recent Codex - unless you go back several editions.

You could call them Alpha Legion, but there was no rules basis for that.

CSM didn't get the toys Loyalists got.

Bharring wrote:
What are you talking about?

There were no rules to make a force Alpha Legion until the most recent Codex - unless you go back several editions.

You could call them Alpha Legion, but there was no rules basis for that.

CSM didn't get the toys Loyalists got.

Alpha Legion has been around for several editions, their specific rules when they came out made them the only ones with access to Cultists at the time. Iron Warriors got an extra Heavy Support, Night Lords got an extra Fast Attack, Word Bearers had special rules for Daemons that I don't recall.

As for AL Berzerkers, they are clearly inferior to World Eaters Berzerkers, or at least different, they don't have the Butcher's Nails implants, consequently, you could easily make a fluff argument that they aren't as unhinged as World Eaters. Regardless, fluff isn't really an objective argument against their inclusion in Alpha Legion.

Did I miss the AL rules in 6E and 7E? I don't recall them. I know there were Legions in the 3.5 Dex, but AL didn't have the -1-to-hit attribute or the Infiltrate stratagem.

I thought there was an AL artifact, but I don't recall them having a Chapter Tactic or suppliment like Black Legion.

Aren't Berzerkers cult troops, dedicated to Khorne? As in, 'Blood for the blood god!' not 'Sneaky for the sneak god!'? Sure, they'd be less crazed than the original WE Zerkers, but by what logic is a blood-crazed maniac more stealthy than the average Warband's CSM? More stealthy than a Tau Pathfinder or UM Scout squad?

The original point was lost pages ago, so perhaps I should try to redirect back to the point:
If Iron Hands shouldn't need to repaint or proxy as UM, why should World Eaters need to repaint or proxy as AL?

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
The argument that "just paint your guys like X and just say they're Y" doesn't change the fact that X is bad.

If I want to play X, I should be able to play X just as well as Y.

Otherwise, you may as well say "Well, I know Tau are bad, but what if you take your Tau models and play them as Eldar instead?"
Tau are still bad.

Some people don't just want to play the same list everyone else does, with the same <Chapter> and suchlike. Not all Ultramarine players want to take Guilliman, Razorbacks and Stormravens. Not all Raven Guard players want to take Helblasters. Not all Artilley-guard players want to be Catachans or Cadians.

I mean, you can either judge balance by top-level tournament results, in which case you're judging based on frequency, number of different units, placing....and ignoring the lower tier stuff.

Or, you can judge based on casual play, and look at depth available, which factions are good, how unique they are, etc. In which case, you've got a much harder time providing "proof" that say, codex Space Marines is better than codex: admech or something. It's silly to use data involving top tournament placings and construct an argument involving casual play, though.

I think it's easy to make the argument that there are more useful Legions in casual tier play than there are useful chapters of marines, but you're going to have a hard time arguing that Marines have less viable subfactions/units as a percentage than, say, Admech, who has exactly two good options (the Raven Guard clones and Mars) that are even close to as good as Salamanders, Raven Guard, Ultramarines, even stuff like White Scars or Imperial Fists that are generally considered crappier. The only chapter or legion that approaches Ryza level worthless is Word Bearers.

Bharring wrote:
Did I miss the AL rules in 6E and 7E? I don't recall them. I know there were Legions in the 3.5 Dex, but AL didn't have the -1-to-hit attribute or the Infiltrate stratagem.

I thought there was an AL artifact, but I don't recall them having a Chapter Tactic or suppliment like Black Legion.

Aren't Berzerkers cult troops, dedicated to Khorne? As in, 'Blood for the blood god!' not 'Sneaky for the sneak god!'? Sure, they'd be less crazed than the original WE Zerkers, but by what logic is a blood-crazed maniac more stealthy than the average Warband's CSM? More stealthy than a Tau Pathfinder or UM Scout squad?

Chaos was horrible 5th-7th edition as far as Legions go, I barely played those editions they were so horrible, so you may be correct on that count.

As far as sneaky Berzerkers and all that, I tend to think of it this way, is a serial killer who sneaks into people's houses, kills them and bathes in their blood any less dedicated to the lord of murder? I would say no, he's just a different kind of killer. So I tend to think of AL Berzerkers like sneaky serial killer psychopaths rather than screaming hordes of madmen.

That would be an interesting take on Zerkers, but isn't that more like a regular Marine? Isn't that sneaky psycho not a blood crased berzerker (small-B)?

If I were doing AL Zerkers, I think I'd do counts-as with your idea. Basically, the archetype of Night Lords.

All Khorne-marked Marines are serial killer psychopaths. Some are sneakier than others. Zerkers, I thought, were supposed to be the screaming madmen who thrash with anything at just about anything.

(Chaos was really terrible for Legion players. They called it Codex:Helldrake for a reason.)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The fluff can vary on exactly what Khorne wants, to some degree. All say he wants blood. Most say he wants combat and frenzy and brutality. Some say he respects honorable combat. I'm sure he'd rather see murder than not see murder, but it's not his core.

Khaine - which may have been an aspect of Khorne - was also the god of Murder. So there is that angle.

Bharring wrote:
That would be an interesting take on Zerkers, but isn't that more like a regular Marine? Isn't that sneaky psycho not a blood crased berzerker (small-B)?

Well all Chapters and Legions carry certain personality traits and tendencies as a result of their geneseed. The Alpha Legion traits tend towards stealth and infiltration, Night Lords thrill in causing terror, etc.

Honestly, the only one that really feels out of place is Rubric Marines, but honestly, I've always hated that piece of fluff, 1st edition Thousand Sons were not Rubric, but they got more mutations than any other legion, so they had the highest chance of just becoming Chaos Spawn. But we're 25+ years removed from that, so I'll get over it.

 Crimson wrote:

tneva82 wrote:


Yes and that's up to you. Wouldn't play it like that myself but don't expect others to follow same idea as I. It's legal and as it is 40k doesn't even have official WYSIWYG requirement let alone paint job requirements!

So it's up to what player wants. So if he wants Guillimann painted in Alpha Legion colours then that's up to him.

Yes, but the whole original point was that some people don't want to use Guilliman for very good reasons*, and thus it sucks that he is the linchpin of any remotely competitive marine list.

(*For example many fluff minded players do not want butcher the fluff to include additional Primarchs and if they don't want to field 'actual' Guilliman (in-fluff sens) they they're fethed.)

I'll still argue that Space Marines can be quite competetive without Guilliman. The Chapter Master plus Lieutenant gives you 75ish percent the Guilliman buff, at less than half the cost, while also filling your HQ slots.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

the_scotsman wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
The argument that "just paint your guys like X and just say they're Y" doesn't change the fact that X is bad.

If I want to play X, I should be able to play X just as well as Y.

Otherwise, you may as well say "Well, I know Tau are bad, but what if you take your Tau models and play them as Eldar instead?"
Tau are still bad.

Some people don't just want to play the same list everyone else does, with the same <Chapter> and suchlike. Not all Ultramarine players want to take Guilliman, Razorbacks and Stormravens. Not all Raven Guard players want to take Helblasters. Not all Artilley-guard players want to be Catachans or Cadians.

I mean, you can either judge balance by top-level tournament results, in which case you're judging based on frequency, number of different units, placing....and ignoring the lower tier stuff.

Or, you can judge based on casual play, and look at depth available, which factions are good, how unique they are, etc. In which case, you've got a much harder time providing "proof" that say, codex Space Marines is better than codex: admech or something. It's silly to use data involving top tournament placings and construct an argument involving casual play, though.

I think it's easy to make the argument that there are more useful Legions in casual tier play than there are useful chapters of marines, but you're going to have a hard time arguing that Marines have less viable subfactions/units as a percentage than, say, Admech, who has exactly two good options (the Raven Guard clones and Mars) that are even close to as good as Salamanders, Raven Guard, Ultramarines, even stuff like White Scars or Imperial Fists that are generally considered crappier. The only chapter or legion that approaches Ryza level worthless is Word Bearers.

I also agree with this sentiment. Top level tournaments are fine to argue about, but they represent 1% (probably less) of the warhammer play experience.

What most people want is a codex viable enough to do reasonably well in their local meta.

If your a total adherent to fluff then Berzerkers are World Eaters. Period. They may have defected and joined warbands etc, changed their paint jobs some like the hounds of abandon but either way a berzerker is a world eater. They have the nails.

Iother marines can fall to Khorne and become blood crazed. In one of The nightlords books a nightlord falls to Khorne. He keeps it hidden from his brethren and sneaks out to satiate his thirst, ending up blaming it on another of the same warband. He has fallen to Khorne but is not a berzerker.

I think any legion can field amazing specialist assault troops. You can use berzerker rules to simulate this however they will never be berzerkers and imho should not be painted or represented as such. A true world eater berzerker after all is a Troop choice, and has an extra attack on the charge because WE. I feel like a nighlords berzerker could be any midnight clad warrior with a chain ax and the pointy bat ear helm etc. you probably should have a Khornate symbol somewhere on each model or at least carried aloft by the unit. That’s just me. I am in the process of kit bashing some Berzerkers mixed with bits from Space wolves so I can play them as Dark Wolves. This allows me to use whatever legion bonus I like without violating fluff.

But, if they are painted red and brass, they are world Eaters. If they are ultra marines and you want to use them as spacewolves the fluff part of me cries foul. Same with a blood angel player fielding the row boat. It just dosnt feel right.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Bharring wrote:
That would be an interesting take on Zerkers, but isn't that more like a regular Marine? Isn't that sneaky psycho not a blood crased berzerker (small-B)?

Well all Chapters and Legions carry certain personality traits and tendencies as a result of their geneseed. The Alpha Legion traits tend towards stealth and infiltration, Night Lords thrill in causing terror, etc.

Honestly, the only one that really feels out of place is Rubric Marines, but honestly, I've always hated that piece of fluff, 1st edition Thousand Sons were not Rubric, but they got more mutations than any other legion, so they had the highest chance of just becoming Chaos Spawn. But we're 25+ years removed from that, so I'll get over it.

I just read Reece’s Space Marines article on BoLS. I never thought you could make a brigade detachment worth a damn. His list is solid. Granted, Raptors’ Chapter Tactics and Lias are strong. I am starting to change my mind about the Space Marine Dex’s competitiveness. I think it is viable for now. But I do agree with others that it will “age” poorly. I think the problem with Bobby G/assback spam is that everybody expects it and knows how to play against it. Who expects Thunderfire Cannons with Tremor Shells and Scout Bikes?

 sennacherib wrote:
If your a total adherent to fluff then Berzerkers are World Eaters. Period. They may have defected and joined warbands etc, changed their paint jobs some like the hounds of abandon but either way a berzerker is a world eater. They have the nails.

Iother marines can fall to Khorne and become blood crazed. In one of The nightlords books a nightlord falls to Khorne. He keeps it hidden from his brethren and sneaks out to satiate his thirst, ending up blaming it on another of the same warband. He has fallen to Khorne but is not a berzerker.

I think any legion can field amazing specialist assault troops. You can use berzerker rules to simulate this however they will never be berzerkers and imho should not be painted or represented as such. A true world eater berzerker after all is a Troop choice, and has an extra attack on the charge because WE. I feel like a nighlords berzerker could be any midnight clad warrior with a chain ax and the pointy bat ear helm etc. you probably should have a Khornate symbol somewhere on each model or at least carried aloft by the unit. That’s just me. I am in the process of kit bashing some Berzerkers mixed with bits from Space wolves so I can play them as Dark Wolves. This allows me to use whatever legion bonus I like without violating fluff.

But, if they are painted red and brass, they are world Eaters. If they are ultra marines and you want to use them as spacewolves the fluff part of me cries foul. Same with a blood angel player fielding the row boat. It just dosnt feel right.

I get your point and more or less agree, I tend to be more rules > fluff, and at this point I have so many CSM models painted in so many different schemes, I just field stuff at this point. The way it's presented these days I think is that the various legions have cult factions within them, but are not specifically from the cult-dedicated chapters, which is obviously a deviation from the original fluff as presented in earlier codices. It's a deviation/evolution of fluff I'm ok with, when the fluff limits the mechanics I am all for changing the fluff.

Actually the Black Legion can create from 0 their own Berzerkers, Noise Marines, Rubrics and Plague Marines.

So a Khorne Berzerker can be a original World Eather, a Black Legionary created post-Heresy, or a chaos marine created by someone like Fabius Bile, for example.
One example provided by GW was about renegade sorcerers that know to make lessers versions of the Ahriman's Rubric, to create rubric marines that they "sell" as bodyguards to Chaos Lords.

And personally I'm too in the camp that rules have names attached for commodity and that they can represent whatever you like as long as you are clear in what weapons they have, etc... (Horus Heresy has this with the rules for Ogryns auxilia. They said that it can represent from reptiles, to xenos monsters, etc...) . Why can't my Poxwalkers be in fact Skeletons raised by magic by a Tzeentch Sorcerer? Or my Hellbrute some kind of alien mostrosity my Chaos Lord has corrupted to Chaos and slaved for his personal use.

Median Trace wrote:
I just read Reece’s Space Marines article on BoLS. I never thought you could make a brigade detachment worth a damn. His list is solid. Granted, Raptors’ Chapter Tactics and Lias are strong. I am starting to change my mind about the Space Marine Dex’s competitiveness. I think it is viable for now. But I do agree with others that it will “age” poorly. I think the problem with Bobby G/assback spam is that everybody expects it and knows how to play against it. Who expects Thunderfire Cannons with Tremor Shells and Scout Bikes?

No one expect thunderfire cannons because they are terrible.

Median Trace wrote:
I just read Reece’s Space Marines article on BoLS. I never thought you could make a brigade detachment worth a damn. His list is solid. Granted, Raptors’ Chapter Tactics and Lias are strong. I am starting to change my mind about the Space Marine Dex’s competitiveness. I think it is viable for now. But I do agree with others that it will “age” poorly. I think the problem with Bobby G/assback spam is that everybody expects it and knows how to play against it. Who expects Thunderfire Cannons with Tremor Shells and Scout Bikes?

What article?

And raptors chapter tactics?
When did FW chapters get tactics exactly?

I didn’t think that black legion could do that though Abaddon is the chosen of all four chaos gods so that makes sense to a degree. I’m a adherent to Nurgle so I can say that real plague marines do arise outside of the death Guard, though they are rare.

If I wanted to play rouboutille (sp)? And I played iron hands or some such, I would convert a suitable iron hands version. Perhaps a dreadnaught combined with bits from skitari or ad mech minis. As long as it was the same size, had the same weapon load out and was intricate enough and had a good amount of effort invested. Jobs a good un.

 BoomWolf wrote:

Median Trace wrote:
I just read Reece’s Space Marines article on BoLS. I never thought you could make a brigade detachment worth a damn. His list is solid. Granted, Raptors’ Chapter Tactics and Lias are strong. I am starting to change my mind about the Space Marine Dex’s competitiveness. I think it is viable for now. But I do agree with others that it will “age” poorly. I think the problem with Bobby G/assback spam is that everybody expects it and knows how to play against it. Who expects Thunderfire Cannons with Tremor Shells and Scout Bikes?

What article?

And raptors chapter tactics?
When did FW chapters get tactics exactly?

They use Ravenguard CT, and Lias gives you free infiltration for units, and re-rolls to hit.

Yea, I know what lias does. he's been a major pain since ever.

So getting my paws on the SM codex and reading a bit - forgeworld chapters just use their primogenitor's tactics, apperantly can use the stratagem, but no warlord trait or relic? I'm getting it right?

 Xenomancers wrote:

Median Trace wrote:
I just read Reece’s Space Marines article on BoLS. I never thought you could make a brigade detachment worth a damn. His list is solid. Granted, Raptors’ Chapter Tactics and Lias are strong. I am starting to change my mind about the Space Marine Dex’s competitiveness. I think it is viable for now. But I do agree with others that it will “age” poorly. I think the problem with Bobby G/assback spam is that everybody expects it and knows how to play against it. Who expects Thunderfire Cannons with Tremor Shells and Scout Bikes?

No one expect thunderfire cannons because they are terrible.

Did you even read his battle reports? They more than carried their weight with CP support.

I think Lias is really a Night Lord.