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I suggest everyone to use the 'ignore' option liberally.

But back to the subject of tactics, fellow traitors I have question for you:
Anyone used lately the either of the Termite Drill options?

Hellforged Termite caught my eye, but the rule not allowing disembarking on same turn is weird. Any experiences using this and how did you try to avoid enemy charging and circling your Termite?
The Hellforged version has also weird lack of melee weapons, except for the pistol. The whole rule design doesn't look so well thought out.

I suggest everyone to use the 'ignore' option liberally.

ignoring a problem doesn't solve a problem.

I can't say i have faced the themite, but not disembarking in the same turn makes it not particulary viable. Except if you make sure that you can't get charged then, which is kinda not the goal when you try to deliver a squad into the heat with such a transport no?

Not Online!!! wrote:

I suggest everyone to use the 'ignore' option liberally.

ignoring a problem doesn't solve a problem.

I can't say i have faced the themite, but not disembarking in the same turn makes it not particulary viable. Except if you make sure that you can't get charged then, which is kinda not the goal when you try to deliver a squad into the heat with such a transport no?

Yeah, I mean it does 1 mortal wound to every enemy unit within 12" upon arriving, so I would preferrably put it as close as possible to not miss out on that.
Of course DS'ing further away is option, as next turn the occupants will have 3"+6"+2D6" threat range, but then we miss the mortal wounds. But even for this one would need screen of some sort, atleast if I was playing against it and it came straight in front of my troops with scary melee unit inside I would try to charge it and box the unit in. Because of the slow movespeed of Termite (6") and general DS restrictions it makes no sense to put shooty units inside (3rd turn out the earliest), one can get similar level of protection using cheapest rhino to shield one's shooty troops in the case one wants to deploy it on own deployment zone. So looking at it, aggressive DS seems like the only reasonable option.

Here is the link to the rules:
https://www.forgeworld.co.uk/resources/PDF/Downloads//Hellforged_Termite_40k.pdf

the rules for the terrax termite got updated awhile ago.

https://www.forgeworld.co.uk/resources/PDF/Downloads//warhammer_40000_termite_assault_drill_en.pdf

Warosaur wrote:
the rules for the terrax termite got updated awhile ago.

https://www.forgeworld.co.uk/resources/PDF/Downloads//warhammer_40000_termite_assault_drill_en.pdf

well that fixes that. At 134 pts it's actually not to terrible.

 SHUPPET wrote:

Spoiler:

 Raichase wrote:

 First Among Gators wrote:
Reading the pure shades of black and white put out in this thread by slayer-fan123 is just too familiar. I think some people just find nuances a bit too disconcerting. However it must be difficult to play this game without getting frustrated while needing to categorize everything into two neat columns. There is much more to this game than deconstructing it to a simple math equation of how much pew each unit has, and you are only doing yourself a disservice as a player by approaching discussion like this. just some advice

Shades of grey stop mattering to some people in a tactics thread who are seeking full optimization. That's their hobby, so I'm not going to muck with it. I enjoy reading these threads to see what the optimum combination of models/units is, and then I'll likely find a way to put a watered down version of it into my own lists, because I'm a far more casual gamer. People here enjoy crunching the numbers and wringing the best value out of their codex, so when you're asking for advice here or reading a discussion on what's the best value for points, you're going to see it come down to stuff like that. Anecdotes and outlier statistics likely don't register, and that's fine.

You play the game your way, include the units you want to use knowing that if you need to know the optimum build for something, this thread is here full of people who will do the number crunching to find it. I personally have found the back and forth between 10 Cultists and 5 CSMs w/ heavy weapon quite interesting. I might go one way, I might go the other, I might try both. It's just interesting to see a far more in-depth discussion on something I have not given much thought to, and with that information readily available, I can use it to improve my lists and my own game.

Nah, he's right. There is more steps in between black and white to each unit at a competitive level, and while you as a casual player aren't at a level where you are able to recognize this and Slayer as a (highly vocal) low-level player is also continually stumped by it, the opinions of most the top players of the game are in direct conflict with this mentality of trying to box every unit and decision into a neat little chart. There's a reason why players like Don Hooson, Nick Nanavati and Sean Nayden go out and win events with units that players of a smaller caliber have previously declared as garbage, that posters like this then rush to find explanations for only afterwards to fit then back into their "categorization", for everything to still make sense to them afterwards.
Aside from all that, slayer's opinions in this thread are nonsense from both a competitive standpoint anyway. Don't mistake confident declarations as accurate and optimal competitive advice.

Well said.

I wouldn't be too harsh on Slayer. Despite recent comments, I've learned much from him and respect his dogged tenacity in discussion.

In all honesty, he's no more guilty of spewing nonsense then the rest of Dakka. Disputes about the worth of a questionable unit tend to be resolved by the harshest critics drowning out the voices of those possessing the insight and patience to make it work. Understanding that dynamic is key to getting anything from value out of this forum, no one should mistake any thread for an accurate and canonical discussion about optimal list design and tactics. The picture that gets painted is a low-resolution version of how something will actually perform on the tabletop, there's no such thing as "garbage tier" in reality.

While this example may seem a little dated, in 5th edition, Chaos Spawn were considered the worst unit in the game. Plenty of reasons to say that, they had no saving throw a special rule called Mindless that made them always move towards the closest enemy unit. But they had 5 wounds, high toughness, lots of attacks, they moved as beasts, and you could take as many of them as you want so long as you had a valid FOC.

I had fun with a list made up of a jump pack Chaos Lord and 2 MSU CSM units with meltas and 32 Spawn. Despite common logic, the massed Spawn were very successful, my record was something like 10 of 12 with it. The art was in the placement at the start of the game, you had to spread them out a certain way to ensure you would be tying up your opponent's entire army. The fact they moved 18 inches a turn made this tricky, especially when there was a lot of terrain.

It's hard to capture why something works in a discussion on Dakka. Raw stats tell part of the story, but the forum is very poor at communicating the tacit details about why something worked when it's non-obvious based on the datasheet. The best you can hope for is indicators about what might work based on the wisdom of the crowds, which isn't always as accurate as it wants to be.

> why would you want to not deploy a unit the turn it arrives from a deepstriking Transport (termite)?

Warpflamer Rubrics. T2 land them near where they need to be, T3 disembark 3” and advance 5+D6” and do horrendous things. Maybe also Warptime them, if there’s a case for it.

Probably not optimal, but a hell of a scarecrow that forces your opponent to either wipe them out or evacuate.

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Raichase wrote:

 First Among Gators wrote:
Reading the pure shades of black and white put out in this thread by slayer-fan123 is just too familiar. I think some people just find nuances a bit too disconcerting. However it must be difficult to play this game without getting frustrated while needing to categorize everything into two neat columns. There is much more to this game than deconstructing it to a simple math equation of how much pew each unit has, and you are only doing yourself a disservice as a player by approaching discussion like this. just some advice

Shades of grey stop mattering to some people in a tactics thread who are seeking full optimization. That's their hobby, so I'm not going to muck with it. I enjoy reading these threads to see what the optimum combination of models/units is, and then I'll likely find a way to put a watered down version of it into my own lists, because I'm a far more casual gamer. People here enjoy crunching the numbers and wringing the best value out of their codex, so when you're asking for advice here or reading a discussion on what's the best value for points, you're going to see it come down to stuff like that. Anecdotes and outlier statistics likely don't register, and that's fine.

You play the game your way, include the units you want to use knowing that if you need to know the optimum build for something, this thread is here full of people who will do the number crunching to find it. I personally have found the back and forth between 10 Cultists and 5 CSMs w/ heavy weapon quite interesting. I might go one way, I might go the other, I might try both. It's just interesting to see a far more in-depth discussion on something I have not given much thought to, and with that information readily available, I can use it to improve my lists and my own game.

Nah, he's right. There is more steps in between black and white to each unit at a competitive level, and while you as a casual player aren't at a level where you are able to recognize this and Slayer as a (highly vocal) low-level player is also continually stumped by it, the opinions of most the top players of the game are in direct conflict with this mentality of trying to box every unit and decision into a neat little chart. There's a reason why players like Don Hooson, Nick Nanavati and Sean Nayden go out and win events with units that players of a smaller caliber have previously declared as garbage, that posters like this then rush to find explanations for only afterwards to fit then back into their "categorization", for everything to still make sense to them afterwards.
Aside from all that, slayer's opinions in this thread are nonsense from both a competitive standpoint anyway. Don't mistake confident declarations as accurate and optimal competitive advice.

They don't top events often when said non-optimal units get used in such a degree it's actually noticed.

This is why I always bring up that one topping list in 6th that used Ahriman and Rubric Marines. Neither of them were good in 6th whatsoever. Nobody jumped to the defense of Rubric Marines ever. It was a simple "Oh. That happened" and nothing was spoken of it since. Anytime a bad unit sees a topping table though, a lot of people say they're balanced and forget simply how BAD Rubric Marines were.

So why does this happen for certain units, and other times we have people that jump immediately and exclaim "See, they're fine!" for others? I have yet to actually figure it out so far. However, we can draw a couple of conclusions about the basic Chaos Marine as a whole, in terms of Black Legion, and what we know about the basic pricing of Loyalist Scum:
1. Loyalist Marines are priced in terms of getting full rerolls for whatever reason.
2. These rerolls come from Chapter Masters and Roboute. A other bonus is Roboute's straight up wounding reroll and what Lieutenants can do.
3. Chaos Marines are priced the same way
4. However, their full reroll can only come from Abigail himself
5. This locks you into a specific Faction moreso than for Loyalists, and it's arguably a pretty bad faction trait only made up for with Abigail himself, who is admittedly a fantastic character (now).
6. You don't have access to rerolling to wound outside melee. With the slew of Characters available to Loyalist Scum to alleviate that, this makes their shooting already better.
7. MSU already works better for Marine type armies anyway, so the advantage to specialize a little more at 10 man squads is, while an upgrade, one that doesn't matter in the long run. It also makes Abigail's morale aura better for cheaper units bought in bulk too. This in turn convinced GW to make Cultists 5 points because they're stupid.

I can go into why Loyalists will do the shooting thing you want with Dreads better too. That's a different post though. I'm just focusing on why Chaos Marines are bad.

So if you look at it, you would see that to create an army like discussed, it would be more beneficial to run Loyalists. However, more and more we notice trends of Marine armies dying out competitively even with all the tricks that Loyalists have. So forgive me when I say, with full confidence, Chaos Marines are a bad unit. Any buff or Strategem you can give them and list as a pro is just a buff that can go to a better unit. We are almost done with all the codices being released, and nothing has changed for Chaos Marines since then. So that's why I have to ask: why is it even up for discussion? They certainly won't counter anything that's new, thats for sure.

I don't think they are necessarily priced with full re-rolls in mind. Its just that GW as a whole tends to overvalue certain things;
- saving throws
- toughness
- strength both in melee and weapons

these things are all overvalued in terms of how many points a unit needs to pay for access to them compared to their effective worth on the table. The end result is that models that specialize in these three things (Space Marines as compared to Guardsmen) end up being overpriced compared to alternatives which do not pay for those things. I think it gives GW too much credit to look at the situation with re-rolls and say "these units are fairly priced when they re-roll everything, GW must have priced them accordingly". I personally don't think GW is that clever and rather the problem is one of GW overvaluing certain traits.

This is also coincidentally why Marines are bad. They pay a lot of points for stats that aren't worth a lot of points. In order for Marines to be good again they either be cheaper reflecting them paying the actual value of their stats, OR the game needs to be changed so that they toughness and armor and strength 4 melee and bolters become more valuable. Marines main problem is they aren't as durable and they don't do as much damage as their pricetag suggests they should be capable of. Still, I don't think 5 CSM with a Heavy Bolter and a champ with a Storm Bolter and a Chain Sword is a bad troop choice. Its not quite up to par or optimal, but its not as far off the mark as one versed in dakka rhetoric may be lead to believe.

If only we had modern kits for them. That would make an awesome 5 man unit, IMO. Soon, one hopes!

It’s a shame that most legion traits are either garbage or hyperspecialized. I think we’ll have to wait for a new codex/edition to see those change.

 Wolf_in_Human_Shape wrote:
If only we had modern kits for them. That would make an awesome 5 man unit, IMO. Soon, one hopes!

It’s a shame that most legion traits are either garbage or hyperspecialized. I think we’ll have to wait for a new codex/edition to see those change.

Remember, the World Eaters one is strictly worse than the one Sisters get. It's almost mind boggling.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Raichase wrote:

 First Among Gators wrote:
Reading the pure shades of black and white put out in this thread by slayer-fan123 is just too familiar. I think some people just find nuances a bit too disconcerting. However it must be difficult to play this game without getting frustrated while needing to categorize everything into two neat columns. There is much more to this game than deconstructing it to a simple math equation of how much pew each unit has, and you are only doing yourself a disservice as a player by approaching discussion like this. just some advice

Shades of grey stop mattering to some people in a tactics thread who are seeking full optimization. That's their hobby, so I'm not going to muck with it. I enjoy reading these threads to see what the optimum combination of models/units is, and then I'll likely find a way to put a watered down version of it into my own lists, because I'm a far more casual gamer. People here enjoy crunching the numbers and wringing the best value out of their codex, so when you're asking for advice here or reading a discussion on what's the best value for points, you're going to see it come down to stuff like that. Anecdotes and outlier statistics likely don't register, and that's fine.

You play the game your way, include the units you want to use knowing that if you need to know the optimum build for something, this thread is here full of people who will do the number crunching to find it. I personally have found the back and forth between 10 Cultists and 5 CSMs w/ heavy weapon quite interesting. I might go one way, I might go the other, I might try both. It's just interesting to see a far more in-depth discussion on something I have not given much thought to, and with that information readily available, I can use it to improve my lists and my own game.

Nah, he's right. There is more steps in between black and white to each unit at a competitive level, and while you as a casual player aren't at a level where you are able to recognize this and Slayer as a (highly vocal) low-level player is also continually stumped by it, the opinions of most the top players of the game are in direct conflict with this mentality of trying to box every unit and decision into a neat little chart. There's a reason why players like Don Hooson, Nick Nanavati and Sean Nayden go out and win events with units that players of a smaller caliber have previously declared as garbage, that posters like this then rush to find explanations for only afterwards to fit then back into their "categorization", for everything to still make sense to them afterwards.
Aside from all that, slayer's opinions in this thread are nonsense from both a competitive standpoint anyway. Don't mistake confident declarations as accurate and optimal competitive advice.

They don't top events often when said non-optimal units get used in such a degree it's actually noticed.

This is why I always bring up that one topping list in 6th that used Ahriman and Rubric Marines. Neither of them were good in 6th whatsoever. Nobody jumped to the defense of Rubric Marines ever. It was a simple "Oh. That happened" and nothing was spoken of it since. Anytime a bad unit sees a topping table though, a lot of people say they're balanced and forget simply how BAD Rubric Marines were.

So why does this happen for certain units, and other times we have people that jump immediately and exclaim "See, they're fine!" for others? I have yet to actually figure it out so far. However, we can draw a couple of conclusions about the basic Chaos Marine as a whole, in terms of Black Legion, and what we know about the basic pricing of Loyalist Scum:
1. Loyalist Marines are priced in terms of getting full rerolls for whatever reason.
2. These rerolls come from Chapter Masters and Roboute. A other bonus is Roboute's straight up wounding reroll and what Lieutenants can do.
3. Chaos Marines are priced the same way
4. However, their full reroll can only come from Abigail himself
5. This locks you into a specific Faction moreso than for Loyalists, and it's arguably a pretty bad faction trait only made up for with Abigail himself, who is admittedly a fantastic character (now).
6. You don't have access to rerolling to wound outside melee. With the slew of Characters available to Loyalist Scum to alleviate that, this makes their shooting already better.
7. MSU already works better for Marine type armies anyway, so the advantage to specialize a little more at 10 man squads is, while an upgrade, one that doesn't matter in the long run. It also makes Abigail's morale aura better for cheaper units bought in bulk too. This in turn convinced GW to make Cultists 5 points because they're stupid.

I can go into why Loyalists will do the shooting thing you want with Dreads better too. That's a different post though. I'm just focusing on why Chaos Marines are bad.

So if you look at it, you would see that to create an army like discussed, it would be more beneficial to run Loyalists. However, more and more we notice trends of Marine armies dying out competitively even with all the tricks that Loyalists have. So forgive me when I say, with full confidence, Chaos Marines are a bad unit. Any buff or Strategem you can give them and list as a pro is just a buff that can go to a better unit. We are almost done with all the codices being released, and nothing has changed for Chaos Marines since then. So that's why I have to ask: why is it even up for discussion? They certainly won't counter anything that's new, thats for sure.

See thats a great explanation of why you feel the way you do about the units. I definitely agree with the statement that loyalist do shooting better than traitors when you consider their support. Chaos does cc better than marines for the same reason. However that doesnt mean you cant do shooty chaos, you just need to understand that other forces will outshoot you normally and you will need to use the advantages we do have to make ours better. Examples would be like taking a deamon engines for shooting for using demonforged to reroll hits and wounds, endless canophy, prescience, and vets of the long war. This can help give us a boost to make things better. So the question becomes should we talk about how to maoe what we have better/useable or should we only talk about the top units we have?

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Wolf_in_Human_Shape wrote:
If only we had modern kits for them. That would make an awesome 5 man unit, IMO. Soon, one hopes!

It’s a shame that most legion traits are either garbage or hyperspecialized. I think we’ll have to wait for a new codex/edition to see those change.

Remember, the World Eaters one is strictly worse than the one Sisters get. It's almost mind boggling.

It's the nature of creep. All of this last years traits have gotten progressively better after the Necron release. Still some duds in each book, but offset by a trait or two that are insanely OP. Look at the Ork book, snakebites 6+++ is objectively worse then the defskulls 6++ but on top of that the defskulls get obsec on all infantry and a free reroll to a hit, wound and damage per phase Also a creep on salamanders) I am wondering what will happen when my GSC gets their book, hopefully they find a good middle ground and stop the creep while making all the traits comparable and viable.

 Red Corsair wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Wolf_in_Human_Shape wrote:
If only we had modern kits for them. That would make an awesome 5 man unit, IMO. Soon, one hopes!

It’s a shame that most legion traits are either garbage or hyperspecialized. I think we’ll have to wait for a new codex/edition to see those change.

Remember, the World Eaters one is strictly worse than the one Sisters get. It's almost mind boggling.

It's the nature of creep. All of this last years traits have gotten progressively better after the Necron release. Still some duds in each book, but offset by a trait or two that are insanely OP. Look at the Ork book, snakebites 6+++ is objectively worse then the defskulls 6++ but on top of that the defskulls get obsec on all infantry and a free reroll to a hit, wound and damage per phase Also a creep on salamanders) I am wondering what will happen when my GSC gets their book, hopefully they find a good middle ground and stop the creep while making all the traits comparable and viable.

Space Wolfs would disagree.

He's been brought up a few times already, but how are folks feeling about the Kytan? It seems at his new price point, he has some pretty significant usage. Less because he is strictly as good as other knight-like options, and more because he can benefit so much better from the synergy we provide. With daemonforge alone his shooting becomes better than a single Gatling knight with a sword (an inefficient loadout, I know) with notably better melee than a double gatling knight and a much lower price tag (55 points less, not counting a top gun weapon). I already like gauntlet/sword knights and he's stronger in melee and much stronger in shooting than one of them while only being a bit more expensive.

Add in psychic support like warptime or strength and he's gonna be a tough cookie. I think that him, Mortarion and Magnus can all go into a super heavy detachment (under heretic astares keyword) along with a double avenger knight in a single detachment. Leaves 210 points; enough for a disloyal 32.

...Seems kinda scary.

Azuza001 wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Raichase wrote:

 First Among Gators wrote:
Reading the pure shades of black and white put out in this thread by slayer-fan123 is just too familiar. I think some people just find nuances a bit too disconcerting. However it must be difficult to play this game without getting frustrated while needing to categorize everything into two neat columns. There is much more to this game than deconstructing it to a simple math equation of how much pew each unit has, and you are only doing yourself a disservice as a player by approaching discussion like this. just some advice

Shades of grey stop mattering to some people in a tactics thread who are seeking full optimization. That's their hobby, so I'm not going to muck with it. I enjoy reading these threads to see what the optimum combination of models/units is, and then I'll likely find a way to put a watered down version of it into my own lists, because I'm a far more casual gamer. People here enjoy crunching the numbers and wringing the best value out of their codex, so when you're asking for advice here or reading a discussion on what's the best value for points, you're going to see it come down to stuff like that. Anecdotes and outlier statistics likely don't register, and that's fine.

You play the game your way, include the units you want to use knowing that if you need to know the optimum build for something, this thread is here full of people who will do the number crunching to find it. I personally have found the back and forth between 10 Cultists and 5 CSMs w/ heavy weapon quite interesting. I might go one way, I might go the other, I might try both. It's just interesting to see a far more in-depth discussion on something I have not given much thought to, and with that information readily available, I can use it to improve my lists and my own game.

Nah, he's right. There is more steps in between black and white to each unit at a competitive level, and while you as a casual player aren't at a level where you are able to recognize this and Slayer as a (highly vocal) low-level player is also continually stumped by it, the opinions of most the top players of the game are in direct conflict with this mentality of trying to box every unit and decision into a neat little chart. There's a reason why players like Don Hooson, Nick Nanavati and Sean Nayden go out and win events with units that players of a smaller caliber have previously declared as garbage, that posters like this then rush to find explanations for only afterwards to fit then back into their "categorization", for everything to still make sense to them afterwards.
Aside from all that, slayer's opinions in this thread are nonsense from both a competitive standpoint anyway. Don't mistake confident declarations as accurate and optimal competitive advice.

They don't top events often when said non-optimal units get used in such a degree it's actually noticed.

This is why I always bring up that one topping list in 6th that used Ahriman and Rubric Marines. Neither of them were good in 6th whatsoever. Nobody jumped to the defense of Rubric Marines ever. It was a simple "Oh. That happened" and nothing was spoken of it since. Anytime a bad unit sees a topping table though, a lot of people say they're balanced and forget simply how BAD Rubric Marines were.

So why does this happen for certain units, and other times we have people that jump immediately and exclaim "See, they're fine!" for others? I have yet to actually figure it out so far. However, we can draw a couple of conclusions about the basic Chaos Marine as a whole, in terms of Black Legion, and what we know about the basic pricing of Loyalist Scum:
1. Loyalist Marines are priced in terms of getting full rerolls for whatever reason.
2. These rerolls come from Chapter Masters and Roboute. A other bonus is Roboute's straight up wounding reroll and what Lieutenants can do.
3. Chaos Marines are priced the same way
4. However, their full reroll can only come from Abigail himself
5. This locks you into a specific Faction moreso than for Loyalists, and it's arguably a pretty bad faction trait only made up for with Abigail himself, who is admittedly a fantastic character (now).
6. You don't have access to rerolling to wound outside melee. With the slew of Characters available to Loyalist Scum to alleviate that, this makes their shooting already better.
7. MSU already works better for Marine type armies anyway, so the advantage to specialize a little more at 10 man squads is, while an upgrade, one that doesn't matter in the long run. It also makes Abigail's morale aura better for cheaper units bought in bulk too. This in turn convinced GW to make Cultists 5 points because they're stupid.

I can go into why Loyalists will do the shooting thing you want with Dreads better too. That's a different post though. I'm just focusing on why Chaos Marines are bad.

So if you look at it, you would see that to create an army like discussed, it would be more beneficial to run Loyalists. However, more and more we notice trends of Marine armies dying out competitively even with all the tricks that Loyalists have. So forgive me when I say, with full confidence, Chaos Marines are a bad unit. Any buff or Strategem you can give them and list as a pro is just a buff that can go to a better unit. We are almost done with all the codices being released, and nothing has changed for Chaos Marines since then. So that's why I have to ask: why is it even up for discussion? They certainly won't counter anything that's new, thats for sure.

See thats a great explanation of why you feel the way you do about the units. I definitely agree with the statement that loyalist do shooting better than traitors when you consider their support. Chaos does cc better than marines for the same reason. However that doesnt mean you cant do shooty chaos, you just need to understand that other forces will outshoot you normally and you will need to use the advantages we do have to make ours better. Examples would be like taking a deamon engines for shooting for using demonforged to reroll hits and wounds, endless canophy, prescience, and vets of the long war. This can help give us a boost to make things better. So the question becomes should we talk about how to maoe what we have better/useable or should we only talk about the top units we have?

And I never said we can't do shooty Chaos. The way it has been talked about though is the wrong way to do it.

I'll make a post later about my thoughts on that, though.

Not Online!!! wrote:

 Red Corsair wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Wolf_in_Human_Shape wrote:
If only we had modern kits for them. That would make an awesome 5 man unit, IMO. Soon, one hopes!

It’s a shame that most legion traits are either garbage or hyperspecialized. I think we’ll have to wait for a new codex/edition to see those change.

Remember, the World Eaters one is strictly worse than the one Sisters get. It's almost mind boggling.

It's the nature of creep. All of this last years traits have gotten progressively better after the Necron release. Still some duds in each book, but offset by a trait or two that are insanely OP. Look at the Ork book, snakebites 6+++ is objectively worse then the defskulls 6++ but on top of that the defskulls get obsec on all infantry and a free reroll to a hit, wound and damage per phase Also a creep on salamanders) I am wondering what will happen when my GSC gets their book, hopefully they find a good middle ground and stop the creep while making all the traits comparable and viable.

Space Wolfs would disagree.

Space wolves have a fine trait, they just suck because the only thing 8th hates more then marine armies are combat marines.

Space Wolves at least have a nice host of units to make use of the trait.

drakerocket wrote:
He's been brought up a few times already, but how are folks feeling about the Kytan? It seems at his new price point, he has some pretty significant usage. Less because he is strictly as good as other knight-like options, and more because he can benefit so much better from the synergy we provide. With daemonforge alone his shooting becomes better than a single Gatling knight with a sword (an inefficient loadout, I know) with notably better melee than a double gatling knight and a much lower price tag (55 points less, not counting a top gun weapon). I already like gauntlet/sword knights and he's stronger in melee and much stronger in shooting than one of them while only being a bit more expensive.

Add in psychic support like warptime or strength and he's gonna be a tough cookie. I think that him, Mortarion and Magnus can all go into a super heavy detachment (under heretic astares keyword) along with a double avenger knight in a single detachment. Leaves 210 points; enough for a disloyal 32.

...Seems kinda scary.

The Kytan is amazing. Combines shooting and melee and durability into a huge model that cannot be ignored. And at the current price point, its really reasonable. I am just sad the model I have is LOS instead. :X Actually, running a world eaters army with Kharn and two Kytan Ravagers sounds like a really good mix of shooting and melee. Run up Kharn beside one giving it rerolls to hit, and then use daemon forge on the other... That's 16 str 8 shots with reroll to hit. Really tasty. Who says World eaters cant be shooty hehe. And a Kharn and two Kytan don't even hit 1000 points, so you still got a lot of points to make up the rest of the army.


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Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Wolf_in_Human_Shape wrote:
If only we had modern kits for them. That would make an awesome 5 man unit, IMO. Soon, one hopes!

It’s a shame that most legion traits are either garbage or hyperspecialized. I think we’ll have to wait for a new codex/edition to see those change.

Remember, the World Eaters one is strictly worse than the one Sisters get. It's almost mind boggling.

To be fair though, world eaters trait really help make their berserkers so much more scary. Sister of battle just don't have something like berserkers, so it doesn't really help them much. Their units outside of maybe Celestine would just fold and die if caught up in melee with WE berserkers, trait regardless.

I think that BL 20 marines unit are reasonably good for what they can do, their rules are fair. The problem is their point cost, as there are more units that can do same thing for less or are more resilient for the same price.
I tried them fielding also a couple of knights and they were pretty good in clearing infantry, they simply annihilate any targets with T 5 or 4.
The tricky part about them is to give something to the opponent to shoot at, so they can survive. I find the blood slaughterer pretty useful at it, as they 16” move brings them inside the enemy field and nothing can ignore their damage output, giving time to the marines to advance and double shoot their bolters, 80 shots with +1 to hit and wound are nasty.
Anyway I’m awar3 that they are not a top choice but they can find their spot.
The list was more or less
Lord and sorcerer on jump
2x20 marines
3 blood slaughterer
2 gallants

The big issue I have with large marine squads is Morale. Sadly, despite being super-veteran soldiers who have been fighting for thousands of years... they still run away at the drop of a hat. Abaddon being the only model to give morale immunity is really frustrating, the Dark Apostle extension of leadership does little benefit to marines and more to Cultists just due to the difference in leadership. Don't get me started on the Word Bearers legion trait, which can make a failed morale test... worse!

...So I just came back after a hiatus from this forum. How on earth did "65 points for 5 marines, basic loadout" vs "10 cultists, no stubber/flamers" turn into this? Did my question even get answered?It seems like Slayer and a couple others just completely missed the point of the question.

Well the answer as always is : It depends. Minimun squads it comes down to what your using them for and what they are going against? 5 marines will win vs 10 cultists. 10 cultists will survive longer than 5 marines vs units using plasma. Marines can outshoot cultists and have more flexability. Cultists can redeploy at full strength for 1cp.

So yeah, depends on what you want to use them for and what is going to shoot at them.

Azuza001 wrote:
Well the answer as always is : It depends. Minimun squads it comes down to what your using them for and what they are going against? 5 marines will win vs 10 cultists. 10 cultists will survive longer than 5 marines vs units using plasma. Marines can outshoot cultists and have more flexability. Cultists can redeploy at full strength for 1cp.

So yeah, depends on what you want to use them for and what is going to shoot at them.

Equivalent points would be 5 Marines vs 13 Cultists, actually.

That's part of the problem here is the points you need to invest in the Marines compared to Cultists.

Right, but again it also depends on what your using them for.

If we are talking 13 cultists fighting 5 marines the marines will win.

Cultists go first, 13 shots, say 7 hits, but wounding on 5's so your talking about 2 wounds, vs a 3+ save you will be lucky to kill 1 marine.

Those marines firing on the cultists get 5 shots, probably 4 hits, wounding on 3's is again probably 3 wounds vs 6+ save odds are you killed 3 cultists.

But i doubt we are talking about them vs each other. 13 cultists will live longer vs anything with ap, like a heavy bolter, than the marines will. Both get wounded on 3's, cultists just die but marines have a 50% chance of living. Thats not to hot, that means the marines have an equivalent of 10 to the cultists 13. And with the prevalence of -ap weapons out there the marines die quicker. But marines can get longer range weapons as well to help make up for this, so again this all becomes how do you want to use them?

Oh boy, these old "Cultists vs. CSMs" discussion, i would say Cultists are the better choice because they are cheaper and are better in screening. How ever i am bored to play them, i rather take berzerker as troops only or noisemarines with demonetts.

Whats your opinion on the Heldrake?
Yeah he is not that good in combat or shooting, but if you use him wisly he can jump around like forever in the enemys deployment zone. He can attack tanks in first turn, go out and fire his flamer and get into fights next turn again. With the automatic healing he is like a 16 W model.
I also like the psychological effect, somehow player are im huge fear of that thing and like to shoot it instead of other priority targets.

Why arent Noisemarines B+?
Its one of the best troop choice or the most dakka able unit with abby for a CSM player. Okay, they get rekt against T5 and good LOS terrain.


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To be honest i didnt play my 13p Bolter Marines once this edition. Okay, one time i played a 3 squads of 65p Bolter Marines as Havocs to get a Brigade.

Heldrakes have two aspects to take advantage of:
1. An auto hitting weapon with an okay profile, which counters stuff
2. Insane speed to make charges and therefore tie up units (and they'll fall back or you will)
If you aren't making use of everything, they're never gonna make their points back. Quite honestly, they're unlikely to ever make their points back anyway.

Didn't they go down in price in Chapter Approved too?

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Heldrakes have two aspects to take advantage of:
1. An auto hitting weapon with an okay profile, which counters stuff
2. Insane speed to make charges and therefore tie up units (and they'll fall back or you will)
If you aren't making use of everything, they're never gonna make their points back. Quite honestly, they're unlikely to ever make their points back anyway.

Didn't they go down in price in Chapter Approved too?

They did, and still lack a -1 to hit.
Still are only 4+ hitters if no flamer get's involved, which is a shame since the Hades autocannon is just more versatile.


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Its one of the best troop choice or the most dakka able unit with abby for a CSM player. Okay, they get rekt against T5 and good LOS terrain.

The ammount of additional dakka in combination with the higher pricetag is kinda the issue.
Also remember plague marines dropped again and don't see widespread use. (they make a good alpha legion cheapo plasma msu though)

Heldrakes need the flamer to be 2D6, even if they dropped the damage to 1 as a compromise. Or maybe even 2D3.
I'm okay with them not doing much damage in combat. It's not about hurting what you hit it's more about tying stuff up but it would be nice if it could clear a bit more chaff on the way in with it's flamer.
They generally die first round because they tend to expose themselves to so much firepower so it wouldn't be that OP to be able to kill a few troops with its one opportunity to fire it's flamer...

I have not seen a single heldrake used since 8th dropped, fwiw. Kinda forgot they existed