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 small_gods wrote:
There's always forward operatives. It seems to have been forgotten since the nerf but even a model with a 6" move will have a charge threat range of 16-24" if you depoly on the line.

Forward Operatives with the new Beta Bolter rules is actually pretty sweet. Allows you to fire pretty deeply into your opponent's front line without moving. Still testing the validity of this though, so I'm not entirely sold on it yet.

Eh, at 1 CP per unit though. Even with a better CP farm, it's hard to justify putting forward a bunch of units and their support staff. A 16-24" range isn't useful; you want at least even odds on a charge if you're going to commit to that.

Thinking about it a bit though, it might be tolerable with the nurgle tree for possessed and their support people. So, 7 inches forward first turn (staying within that bubble) followed by a 11 inch move + advance, means..18 inches in. So even odds on a charge and you get 1+ armor saves turn one with -1 to hit in the event you don't get first turn.

I mean, it's almost certainly still not worth it; giving up a detachment and investing in the terrain feature just to make possessed kinda work is almost certainly not a good idea. But it probably is one of the more effective versions of this I have seen.

saint_red wrote:
Chaos Daemon stratagems only work on units with <Daemon> as a *faction* keyword. So no, a MoP cannot use (Daemonic Pact).

The criteria there only applies to CD Stratagems that target a DAEMON unit (specifically, they target a CD and if they generate an aura that affects DAEMON units then non-CD DAEMONS - for instance, Defilers - can benefit from that). DP (and Soul Sacrifice) target a friendly CHAOS CHARACTER and are explicitly an allies synergy thing.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 small_gods wrote:
There's always forward operatives. It seems to have been forgotten since the nerf but even a model with a 6" move will have a charge threat range of 16-24" if you depoly on the line.

Forward Operatives with the new Beta Bolter rules is actually pretty sweet. Allows you to fire pretty deeply into your opponent's front line without moving. Still testing the validity of this though, so I'm not entirely sold on it yet.

Might even make rubrics worth taking.... maybe

Probably not. Rubric's problem isn't really that they are bad; they're not really all that bad in truth. Rubric's problem is that their gun profile really wants to kill MEQs, which don't exist in the meta. If marines, or anything t3-4 with a 3+ save was good and abundant, they'd see much more use.

drakerocket wrote:
Eh, at 1 CP per unit though. Even with a better CP farm, it's hard to justify putting forward a bunch of units and their support staff. A 16-24" range isn't useful; you want at least even odds on a charge if you're going to commit to that.

When you know you're going first it's pretty solid. When you know you're going second, Prepared Positions definitely helps.

drakerocket wrote:
Probably not. Rubric's problem isn't really that they are bad; they're not really all that bad in truth. Rubric's problem is that their gun profile really wants to kill MEQs, which don't exist in the meta. If marines, or anything t3-4 with a 3+ save was good and abundant, they'd see much more use.

Generally speaking I think you're right but with VotLW they have a significant threat to things in the T5-7 range. There's a lot of fliers and transports out there with that profile and dropping them to a 5+ from a 3+ doubles your efficiency.

 Eldarain wrote:
Delivery and resilience are their biggest issues though.

This is what chaos is lacking, all their rules sound neat at first, until you realize that none of them function in practice the way the writer possibly thought they would. Likely because whoever it is doesn't actually play 40k, which is painfully obvious from how laughably bad the rules are written. It's even more obvious that a lot of times what seems to be the intention doesn't work in practice because of the wonky keywords, so i guess the writer of the codex didn't bother to understand how keywords work in the game they're writing rules for. Then GW doesn't even bother fixing it with a new codex, lazy.

Just look at warp talons signature ability, it's basically unusable. Meanwhile my GSC army has dozens of different tricks, combos, and synergies to do what it's supposed to do. They're a blast to play with so many options. It makes chaos look even worse in comparison. What exactly does chaos even do well?

When i saw shadowspear i was all ramped up to completely rebuild my chaos army. I'll pass now because they have no fun or interesting playstyles and the rules are still frustratingly badly written.

Danny slag wrote:
Just look at warp talons signature ability, it's basically unusable.

Rumored +2" charge for deep strike jump pack units stratagem may actually make Warp Talons a bit more functional.

That would be very good thing to have!

Has the synergy between Master of Possession and Decimators already been discussed?

I'm thinking MoP with cursed earth, infernal power and switch smite for prescience hanging out together with a warpsmith and 1-3 decimators with either butcher cannons or soulburners.

It's a bit expensive but it seems pretty durable and pretty killy.

It's cute, but triple contemptors does the same role better.

Gidun wrote:Has the synergy between Master of Possession and Decimators already been discussed?

I'm thinking MoP with cursed earth, infernal power and switch smite for prescience hanging out together with a warpsmith and 1-3 decimators with either butcher cannons or soulburners.

It's a bit expensive but it seems pretty durable and pretty killy.

drakerocket wrote:It's cute, but triple contemptors does the same role better.

Do both?

Well, contemptor has a degrading chart. Has a lower invul save since he won't be affected by the MoP aura, can't get healed by the MoP.

Sure, contemptors have +1BS and 2W on the decimators.But they seem less durable to me in the long run.

Edit: Forgot to mention that they don't get the reroll 1s to hit/wound either.

A nice thing Decimators have over Contemptors is Epidemius synergy

The real question is then how much should I end up relying on synergy rather than the beef of the unit itself. Contemptors cam be argued to not need any babysitting, which is a point in their favor.

A nice thing Decimators have over Contemptors is Epidemius synergy

Seems a tad bit expensive for my taste for guaranteed reroll 1s and +1T (Gods be willing), but should overall be decent at providing a springboard for tally.

The real question is then how much should I end up relying on synergy rather than the beef of the unit itself. Contemptors cam be argued to not need any babysitting, which is a point in their favor.

Absolutely. However I really like the consistency across the decimator provides over contemptors over the course of the turns, provided it doesn't just get blown up to kingdom come.

Edit: Basically, <6 wounds you're gonna have a worse decimator when playing contemptor, and that's without MoP or Warpsmith. And with Sacrifice being 4WC it seem like something you can reliably use. 4+D3W/Turn for decimator. Sounds to me that people are going to have to put a lot of firepower into a 4++ decimator to kill it when it can basically reset to full wounds every turn. Plus if for whatever reason you feel the need to you can use Daemonforge if you need to hit something at T8+. Is there something I'm missing with my line of thought? Even if you skip the warpsmith it sounds like having a MoP as a babysitter should do pretty good.

Edit2: TLDR: i LiKe DeCiMaToRs hurr durr

Gidun wrote:
Well, contemptor has a degrading chart. Has a lower invul save since he won't be affected by the MoP aura, can't get healed by the MoP.

Sure, contemptors have +1BS and 2W on the decimators.But they seem less durable to me in the long run.

Edit: Forgot to mention that they don't get the reroll 1s to hit/wound either.

The degrading profile is a moot point, always has been. Look at the table. by the time a contemptor hits worse then a decimator the decimator would already be dead. It's also ever so slightly cheaper to run the contemptors, 138 compared to 140, who also get their legion trait. Alpha legion contemptor suddenly spike WAY past those decimators even with all the tricks your aiming for. BTW relying on spells is never a good idea. Going second means you start less durable, and a failed cast or a denial will happen.

The rerolling 1's to wound makes the damage average out nearly the same, but again, you relying on a power to go off on a more expensive character. I'll always take passive buffs when I can over random chance ones.

You also get your buffs on everything, not just demon units. Since a backfield is usually populated with none demon fire support I think it's also worth mentioning. I've heard it suggested to use the Lord Discordant to boost BS further, but I think this just makes the problem of cost even worse.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Gidun wrote:

A nice thing Decimators have over Contemptors is Epidemius synergy

Seems a tad bit expensive for my taste for guaranteed reroll 1s and +1T (Gods be willing), but should overall be decent at providing a springboard for tally.

The real question is then how much should I end up relying on synergy rather than the beef of the unit itself. Contemptors cam be argued to not need any babysitting, which is a point in their favor.

Absolutely. However I really like the consistency across the decimator provides over contemptors over the course of the turns, provided it doesn't just get blown up to kingdom come.

Edit: Basically, <6 wounds you're gonna have a worse decimator when playing contemptor, and that's without MoP or Warpsmith. And with Sacrifice being 4WC it seem like something you can reliably use. 4+D3W/Turn for decimator. Sounds to me that people are going to have to put a lot of firepower into a 4++ decimator to kill it when it can basically reset to full wounds every turn. Plus if for whatever reason you feel the need to you can use Daemonforge if you need to hit something at T8+. Is there something I'm missing with my line of thought? Even if you skip the warpsmith it sounds like having a MoP as a babysitter should do pretty good.

Edit2: TLDR: i LiKe DeCiMaToRs hurr durr

Sure, you have some great points there, but in the end it's just a few butchers canons. While butcher canons are solid, they start to lose their polish when you over invest. It's the reason why you didn't see much chatter until points went down. If your putting a MoP and a WS next to your decimators your basically spending ~90-100 points more then three dreads and a chaos lord. Thats not a small chunk of change for the same gun.

EDIT: BTW I also love deci's I own 4 lol. So I do still like the idea, but its an interesting topic. As JNA said, maybe running both in a list would be fun.

I <3 the look of decimators. And, conceptually, I like them more in general. But the reason I say they're just not as good as contemptors is because I wanted them to be and looked at all of this stuff >.> They just end up being worse unfortunately.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Mind you, part of this is that contemptors are just very good and fill the same job, particularly alpha legion ones. They'd probably be meta if vanilla chaos was at all meta and for the fact they are just such lovely targets for castelians.

The look of the decimators make up for the little bit of extra umpf the contemptors provide. I like the contemptors too, so I run both. Decimators in the back shooting line with the other shooting engines (deredeo and leviathon), contemptors moving forward with the blood slaughterers. I wish the decimators and contemptors roles were reversed though as the decimator really looks like he wants to punch someone in the face. The Levi might get more of a frontline spot now that havocs have a new pair of shoes.

Hm, the legion trait is a good point that I overlooked. So basically what what I'm getting from this is this:

Decimators
---------------
+Good synergies/stratagem
+Slightly better defensively unless it's a 1 turn KO
+Not degrading (which I disagree with you being moot)
-No legion trait
-Slightly worse at shooting
-Every decimator post 1 has a diminishing return

Contemptor
----------------
+Legion traits
+No real drawbacks on having more than 1
+ 2W+
+ Slightly better at shooting
+1 combi bolter more/Contemptor
-Worse regen
-Worse synergies/stratagems
-Degrades

Honestly, I think the difference is so slight that whichever you prefer isn't a major hurdle. I do however concede that it's easy to overinvest in the decimator. One CL/Warpsmith/MoP might be enough for it to be decent enough due to Daemonforge.

1 WS is not slightly worse at shooting, it's a solid downside. They're not better defensively, they lack 2 w and probably -1 to hit. At what point does the degrading matter? If they've both taken 0-5 wounds, the contemptor is better. If they've both taken 6-7 wounds, they're even. If they've both taken 8-9 wounds, the contemptor is better because the decemator is dead.

The regen...eh, that's hard. If things didn't get so alpha-striked in this edition, it might be worthwhile. Unfortunately, healing is a pretty weak mechanic. It doesn't synergize particularly well; sure you can give it rerolls of 1 to hit and wound by casting a 50-50 power, and/or +1 saves (which isn't quite as good as -1 to hit, plus you don't get it if your opponent goes first). To do so you need to probably devote a 90 point model to hanging around them, just to bring them up to par on shooting and toughness (rerolling 1s to hit and wound probably nets something comparable to an additional WS). And there is no guarantee you'll get off both of those spells. Tossing daemonforge on a contemptor anti-synergies with a LoP. Most other daemon synergies are melee oriented.

Like, if your argument is "I <3 this model and it's perfectly decent", your argument is valid. It is decent. But it is just a strictly worse choice. Like, if two models did the exact same thing and one was 100 points and one was 90, the 90 point one would be better. But if I <3'd the model, I might just run the 100 point one anyway.

Contemptors don't get access to Daemonforge. Why I'm saying decimators are slightly worse is because with 8 shots at BS 3 vs 2 the contemptor is gonna get in 1,5ish more shots/turn.

This on the other hand changes in favor of the decimator when you factor in daemonforge which contemptor doesn't have access to.

1CP-Decimator > Contemptor > Decimator offensively. The difference between 1CP-D and Contemptor increases the higher toughness or -hits the target you're aiming at has.

And yes, in a vaccuum the contemptor has a better statline offensively and defensively, but disregarding synergies that the the overall chaos faction can bring (read: Nurgle discipline) brings it down to at the very least equal footing for a not very expensive price.

I'm not a super competetive player, nor am I part of the american meta so it might be a difference between that and where I live, but generally I don't see my 8W+ T7 models with 5++ die all the time in one turn.

Edit: Added bold

It's the "not a competitive player" part. Turn one destroy all the things! really hurts this edition--it's not an American meta thing, it's a rules thing. I get that they wanted it to play faster, but when the game is over in two rounds, I sort of feel cheated out of an actual game.

So where is the cut-off point with wounds? If 2W is the difference between being blown up during 1 turn or not?

Wouldn't it be better to invest another 39 pts in a deredeo and get +4W?

Disregard the fact that they are different slots, it's more of a hypothetical question on expectations vs the reality of the game.

I would say yes, but that is dependent on a lot of factors. What detatchments are you running to get CP and/or buffs? What leader characters are you running to get auras and buffs? What other units do you want surrounding your deredeo? What, if any, sort of theme or narrative do you want with your army? 8th ed. Is fantastic in some respects (it allows for pretty much whatever sort of army you want to run to run at a low competitive level quite well. It also sucks in that if you are running at a turbocharged level, everything is going to burn out by turn two.

Gidun wrote:
Contemptors don't get access to Daemonforge. Why I'm saying decimators are slightly worse is because with 8 shots at BS 3 vs 2 the contemptor is gonna get in 1,5ish more shots/turn.

This on the other hand changes in favor of the decimator when you factor in daemonforge which contemptor doesn't have access to.

1CP-Decimator > Contemptor > Decimator offensively. The difference between 1CP-D and Contemptor increases the higher toughness or -hits the target you're aiming at has.

And yes, in a vaccuum the contemptor has a better statline offensively and defensively, but disregarding synergies that the the overall chaos faction can bring (read: Nurgle discipline) brings it down to at the very least equal footing for a not very expensive price.

I'm not a super competetive player, nor am I part of the american meta so it might be a difference between that and where I live, but generally I don't see my 8W+ T7 models with 5++ die all the time in one turn.

Edit: Added bold

Daemonforge can only be used on one model a time. If you used it on a Maulerfiend earlier, then the Decimator is kinda SOL don't you think? Plus I think it was FAQd that Contemptors can use the Fire Frenzy Strategem right? If not, do disregard that.

Wait, I feel like you kind of deflected my question.

The point I was getting at was that if everything blows up in 1 turn the defensive portion isn't really a factor which in turn means the only relevant part of decimator vs contemptor is the offensive part. And I'm prepared to make the claim that as long as you have the CP to feed your decimator it will by default be better than the contemptor.

Just to reaffirm, as soon as you add another decimator you're better off taking a contemptor due to diminishing returns.

This is all a bit hyperbolic, but I honestly can't agree with the notion that it all takes place in a vaccum which seems to be the argument. If it really was that lethal we'd be better off simply investing in distraction carnifexes instead. And afaik nobody runs 3+ contemptors/decimators to simply get to attack with any of them.

I'd just like to say that I appreciate you making your case, hopefully I'll learn something if nothing else.



Automatically Appended Next Post:


They did get the HELBRUTE keyword, but fire frenzy is for the unit Helbrute. So basically they gained access to legion traits.

Absolutely, Damonforge is limited, hence why it's a diminishing return on having several decimators. What I'm trying to argue is the merits of having decimator(s) over contemptor. Usually I would try to avoid building a list where it's oversaturated with units having to rely on the same stratagem,
which makes your point a little bit of an outlier.


Edit: Just to illustrate my point and go further down the rabbithole. If you are able to hypothetically fire your butcher cannons at full effect for an entire 7 game turns. Then the hit difference between BS2 and BS3 is 9 hits. Sure, it's the difference of having an additional turn of shooting and hitting everything. But how often does this scenario actually come up? And the second you add in two turns of Daemonforge they even out against MEQ, So on the opposite end of the spectrum, lets pretend you only get 1-2 turns to shoot before kicking the bucket. Then you end up with a difference of 1 hit in favor of the decimator and 3 damage, once again, this difference only increases the higher toughness target you point your cannons at.

In other news Dark Apostate just became one of our best HQs if he stays reasonably priced.

drakerocket wrote:


In other news Dark Apostate just became one of our best HQs if he stays reasonably priced.

-1 to hit prayer.

+ miasma

+ al trait = -3 to hit marines.

(I excluded cultists mostly due to Mere Mortals)