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So since the new CSM look so tasty and I first cut my teeth in 40k with Black Legion, I am returning to my warmaster! I'd like to start this with saying I have no intention of actually fielding any cultists at all, purely CSM or Daemons for me but my Alpha Legion buddy is very annoyed at the new Codex where Cultists will lose their trait AND still retain their 5ppm price tag. He looks over at Imperial Guard and wonders how on earth Guardsmen could be 4ppm.

What is everyone elses thought on this? Personally I'm cool with it ONLY if Guardsmen get a price hike, hell if cultists are 5ppm no trait I could see IG at 6ppm and maybe my beloved gaunts going up to 5 PPM.

Or make CSM useful and give all CSM chainsword for free in addition to bolter and pistol... (or make them chosen, but I like having the options in elites choice that aren't cult troops)

You will see guardsmen remaining at 4ppm because reasons. You can put your cultists where I'm going to put mine, just at that place where the sun don't shine.

They want us to play more marines and less cultists. And instead of make marines better, they made cultists worse.

It sucks but I am too busy being distracted by all of the new CSM releases to get upset.

Good. Why should a Cultist whose lifespan is usually measured in minutes get VOTLW etc.? I say this as a CSM player.

Cultists shouldn't have been 5 points in the first place.

 Grimtuff wrote:
Good. Why should a Cultist whose lifespan is usually measured in minutes get VOTLW etc.? I say this as a CSM player.

They definitely shouldn't, but they also shouldn't cost more than guard for being worse than guard in almost every way.

Cultists are probably worth 5 points now.

- DA gives them a 5++ in a bubble before anyone shoots.
- They can get +1A for outnumbering as Black Legion
- Reroll failed charges when in Cult of the Damned

There are potentially quite a few tools now that can make cultists pretty solid.

Good, now remove VOTLW from them. Cultists shouldn't be the go-to troop other than as chaff.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Cultists are probably worth 5 points now.

- DA gives them a 5++ in a bubble before anyone shoots.
- They can get +1A for outnumbering as Black Legion
- Reroll failed charges when in Cult of the Damned

There are potentially quite a few tools now that can make cultists pretty solid.

So they aren't worth 5 points because you have to pour so many resources into them in the first place. Got it.

So is this a case of IG get too much for far too little rather than Cultists being objectively bad?

Edited my crappy spelling

Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

Send in the Next Wave? Which is also 2CP and not limited to once a game?
It isn't like Valhalla is a bad army either.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Cultists are probably worth 5 points now.

- DA gives them a 5++ in a bubble before anyone shoots.
- They can get +1A for outnumbering as Black Legion
- Reroll failed charges when in Cult of the Damned

There are potentially quite a few tools now that can make cultists pretty solid.

I'm trying to see how are cultists justified at 5 ppm when tzaangors are 7ppm:

- 5++ save without having to bother with a DA
- They get +1 attack without having to do anything
- Reroll failed charges with a mutalith around
-have a better WS, Str, toughness and +2 leadership.
-They get to keep VotlW.
-They get a +1 to advance and charge upgrade.

That's all before adding character support whatsoever. 7ppm vs 5ppm.

If the cultist is justified at 5 ppm, then a guardsman should 100% be 6ppm, which would make the tzaangor a 9ppm and keep the astartes marines justified at 13ppm??? I don't really see how would that make sense unless we were making practically everything non troop +25% more points.

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

This along with a few other comments show that due to how GW has designed the game makes balance even harder than before. Between Strats, Auras from characters or other buffs and chapter traits, costing a unit is nightmare even if GW was making a good faith effort to balance every unit. Putting aside comparisons to guardsmen how effective a cultist unit is swings wildly based on the above.

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

The ego behind this statement... I can't even. Tell me how armies with cultists in them fare these days compared to armies with guardsmen in them.

Yup, that's what I thought.

The more significant concern is squad size is now limited to 30. The downsides to this are manifest. Tide of Traitors just became 25% less effective and squads just became significantly easier to wipe out. Drowning your opponent in low-strength attacks just became more of a stretch.

Part of how I justified the cost of Cultists was the chance large squads can be returned to full health. This cap (and the nice models coming out of Shadowspear) makes the case for using Renegades and Heretics going forward.

I do think unit pricing needs a holistic approach though. Some armies might pay more for specific tools than others, and that's OK.

It is just another black mark against soup that it allows players to short circuit this process!

 Bach wrote:
They want us to play more marines and less cultists. And instead of make marines better, they made cultists worse.

It sucks but I am too busy being distracted by all of the new CSM releases to get upset.

Increasingly i think this is basically it. The army name is Chaos Space Marines, and GW wants Space Marines to be the primary units. Now, why they wont adjust the CSM units themselves is beyond me, but they really seem to want the focus on CSMs and not Cultists.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

Send in the Next Wave? Which is also 2CP and not limited to once a game?
It isn't like Valhalla is a bad army either.

Was nerfed within days of IG codex release. You have to allocate reinforcement points prior to the game begins. The units are not free. So essentially you pay CP to bring in reserves that would be free otherwise. Might be in the running for the worst stratagem in all of 8th edition.

topaxygouroun i wrote:

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

The ego behind this statement... I can't even. Tell me how armies with cultists in them fare these days compared to armies with guardsmen in them.

Yup, that's what I thought.

If you detect bitterness in my post its simply because GW wasted no time in nerfing send in the next wave. It was literally nerfed within days of the codex coming out as it was deemed OP. Meanwhile tide of traitors has been available basically this entire edition & was only recently nerfed in the last 6 months to be limited to once per game. Even in its nerfed state it is an incredible stratagem. Its free units. The only armies that I'm aware of have access to such stratagems are chaos & orks. Orks makes sense but chaos? So the army that is literally known for drowning their foes in bodies (IG) cannot have such a stratagem but chaos can? From a lore perspective it makes no sense. Guard are in a good place competitively. I'm not asking for buffs. I'm simply pointing out the irony of removing an ability that should be present in one army & giving it to another where it shouldn't.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Cultists are probably worth 5 points now.

- DA gives them a 5++ in a bubble before anyone shoots.
- They can get +1A for outnumbering as Black Legion
- Reroll failed charges when in Cult of the Damned

There are potentially quite a few tools now that can make cultists pretty solid.

So they aren't worth 5 points because you have to pour so many resources into them in the first place. Got it.

Straken
Priest
Company Commanders
Ogryn BG

Hmm...

topaxygouroun i wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Cultists are probably worth 5 points now.

- DA gives them a 5++ in a bubble before anyone shoots.
- They can get +1A for outnumbering as Black Legion
- Reroll failed charges when in Cult of the Damned

There are potentially quite a few tools now that can make cultists pretty solid.

I'm trying to see how are cultists justified at 5 ppm when tzaangors are 7ppm:

- 5++ save without having to bother with a DA
- They get +1 attack without having to do anything
- Reroll failed charges with a mutalith around
-have a better WS, Str, toughness and +2 leadership.
-They get to keep VotlW.
-They get a +1 to advance and charge upgrade.

That's all before adding character support whatsoever. 7ppm vs 5ppm.

If the cultist is justified at 5 ppm, then a guardsman should 100% be 6ppm, which would make the tzaangor a 9ppm and keep the astartes marines justified at 13ppm??? I don't really see how would that make sense unless we were making practically everything non troop +25% more points.

As a thousand sons player, I've noticed this. Because I have tzangors, I have absolutely zero interest in cultists apart from maybe a min point squad to squat on objectives. But I think a single chaos spawn would be cheaper, tougher, faster, and easier to hide.

topaxygouroun i wrote:

I'm trying to see how are cultists justified at 5 ppm when tzaangors are 7ppm:

- 5++ save without having to bother with a DA
- They get +1 attack without having to do anything
- Reroll failed charges with a mutalith around
-have a better WS, Str, toughness and +2 leadership.
-They get to keep VotlW.
-They get a +1 to advance and charge upgrade.

That's all before adding character support whatsoever. 7ppm vs 5ppm.

If the cultist is justified at 5 ppm, then a guardsman should 100% be 6ppm, which would make the tzaangor a 9ppm and keep the astartes marines justified at 13ppm??? I don't really see how would that make sense unless we were making practically everything non troop +25% more points.

That's if you want to spring for a TS detachment, which carries it's own point sinks. If you want to make 5 point cultists worthwhile there appear to be avenues to do so. I can't tell you everything, because I don't have the books yet, but the picture is not as bleak as some are making it out to be.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kap'n Krump wrote:


As a thousand sons player, I've noticed this. Because I have tzangors, I have absolutely zero interest in cultists apart from maybe a min point squad to squat on objectives. But I think a single chaos spawn would be cheaper, tougher, faster, and easier to hide.

I never run cultists as TS these days. That doesn't mean cultists shouldn't necessarily be 5 points.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Bach wrote:
They want us to play more marines and less cultists. And instead of make marines better, they made cultists worse.

It sucks but I am too busy being distracted by all of the new CSM releases to get upset.

Increasingly i think this is basically it. The army name is Chaos Space Marines, and GW wants Space Marines to be the primary units. Now, why they wont adjust the CSM units themselves is beyond me, but they really seem to want the focus on CSMs and not Cultists.

87 points for a unit that puts out 8 S5 AP-1 D1 shots and 10 S4 Ap- D1 shots is pretty decent IMO. Even if you didn't get 8CP for a battalion of them, and you do, I'd say those are a fairly worthwhile unit.

Now that Havocs are T5 and can be set up out of LOS thanks to move and shoot heavy, and a combi-plasma terminator costs 38, I think competitive chaos lists will be using a lot more power armor now.

Red Corsair battalion with 2x cheap HQs (maybe the new Robin Hood Men In Tights executioner guy, with advance and charge he might be decent), 3 87-point csm squads, and an alpha legion battalion with 3 more CSM squads, a dark apostle, a lord, some havocs with lascannons and 1 ML, and a squad of deep striking terminators with combiplasma and MoS sounds fairly effective.

If you set up a squad of havocs in cover a catachan basilisk with reroll 1s to hit does less than 1 unsaved wound on average. They're pretty solid little heavy weapons platforms with the T5, since that grants a die shift against most weapons you would use against them at range (basilisks, disintegrators, overcharged plasma, etc)

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

Send in the Next Wave? Which is also 2CP and not limited to once a game?
It isn't like Valhalla is a bad army either.

Tide of traitors is once per game

 chimeara wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

Send in the Next Wave? Which is also 2CP and not limited to once a game?
It isn't like Valhalla is a bad army either.

Tide of traitors is once per game

For all we know that restriction could get removed.

 Commissar Benny wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

Send in the Next Wave? Which is also 2CP and not limited to once a game?
It isn't like Valhalla is a bad army either.

Was nerfed within days of IG codex release. You have to allocate reinforcement points prior to the game begins. The units are not free. So essentially you pay CP to bring in reserves that would be free otherwise. Might be in the running for the worst stratagem in all of 8th edition.

topaxygouroun i wrote:

 Commissar Benny wrote:
Doesn't Chaos have access to tide of traitors/aka free models still? Its one of the best stratagems in the game. Guard doesn't have access to that. What more do you want?

The ego behind this statement... I can't even. Tell me how armies with cultists in them fare these days compared to armies with guardsmen in them.

Yup, that's what I thought.

If you detect bitterness in my post its simply because GW wasted no time in nerfing send in the next wave. It was literally nerfed within days of the codex coming out as it was deemed OP. Meanwhile tide of traitors has been available basically this entire edition & was only recently nerfed in the last 6 months to be limited to once per game. Even in its nerfed state it is an incredible stratagem. Its free units. The only armies that I'm aware of have access to such stratagems are chaos & orks. Orks makes sense but chaos? So the army that is literally known for drowning their foes in bodies (IG) cannot have such a stratagem but chaos can? From a lore perspective it makes no sense. Guard are in a good place competitively. I'm not asking for buffs. I'm simply pointing out the irony of removing an ability that should be present in one army & giving it to another where it shouldn't.

Cultists are now capped at 30 models, so that makes tide of traitors even worse than before. More than just 25% worse, since killing 30 cultists outright -cultists that don't have -1 to be hit any more- is many times easier than trying to kill 40 alpha legion ones.

Also, Tyranids can summon free units with sporocysts, harpies and biovores. And the worst stratagem in the game is easily the sporefield of tyranids. Also costs reinforcement points only it doesn't bring back anything useful.

It's hard to feel bad for 5 pt models. 5 pt models shouldnt get special traits or have good buff options to begin with. Being cheap shouldnt be all upside.

Martel732 wrote:
It's hard to feel bad for 5 pt models. 5 pt models shouldnt get special traits or have good buff options to begin with. Being cheap shouldnt be all upside.

What about 4ppm models that are strictly better?

topaxygouroun i wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
It's hard to feel bad for 5 pt models. 5 pt models shouldnt get special traits or have good buff options to begin with. Being cheap shouldnt be all upside.

What about 4ppm models that are strictly better?

They should be 6 ppm or lose regiments and orders. Guardsmen should have no traits and no buffs at their price point.

Martel732 wrote:

topaxygouroun i wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
It's hard to feel bad for 5 pt models. 5 pt models shouldnt get special traits or have good buff options to begin with. Being cheap shouldnt be all upside.

What about 4ppm models that are strictly better?

They should be 6 ppm or lose regiments and orders. Guardsmen should have no traits and no buffs at their price point.

So until they do, I'd say we're fine feeling bad for 5ppm cultists.