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The Word Bearers funnily enough, might actually be one of the exceptions mentioned, as fluff does call them out as being one of the few Legions who have remained mostly cohesive and together

I think you likely replied after my last edit, so forgive me for reiterating what I added here.

Broadly, I think we all agree actually. I don't think anyone is saying the Legions themselves shouldn't have representation in the rules. I wouldn't want that. I want you, or anyone else who chooses to field a pure, Legion force, to feel like they can. I think many of us would just also like to not feel like we're coerced into doing so.

If I can use Gad as an example? (Apologies Gad).

Gad plays Night Lords, but doesn't seem satisfied with their current crunch representation. I believe he feels they're too shoe-horned into being the 'fear' gimmick Legion currently.
We're saying, why not allow him to paint up his Night Lords Warband/Legion element, and choose the traits for them he feels, as a long time Night Lord player, represents them. Perhaps for examples sake he picks a Stealth based trait, and a Fear based one.

But maybe Gad would prefer to recreate the specific Warband from ADB's Night Lords trilogy. In this instance, at least one member was from (if memory serves)the Red Corsairs. Perhaps then he picks a Stealth based trait (NL's) and something that represents the RC's being the premier Astartes at boarding actions.
That same Warband, as a larger group, at one time had a portion of its make up who were profoundly Daemonically influenced, so perhaps he picks a trait instead that represents that side of them.

See, I think no one wants the Legions gone. Just a better way to represent how they now exist.

The issue with WB specifically is that all of the things they are known for (Dark Apostles, Possessed, summoning Daemons) everyone else can do anyway. On top of that their Legion trait is just flat out garbage. Honestly I'm not 100% sure how I would fix all the issues but as it stands the Legions are a worse choice than Renegade Chapters and the Loyalist Codex gives better options for accurately representing CSM forces than any of the CSM rules.
Other posters seem to have some good ideas regarding Warband origin + something else.

 Gert wrote:
The issue with WB specifically is that all of the things they are known for (Dark Apostles, Possessed, summoning Daemons) everyone else can do anyway. On top of that their Legion trait is just flat out garbage. Honestly I'm not 100% sure how I would fix all the issues but as it stands the Legions are a worse choice than Renegade Chapters and the Loyalist Codex gives better options for accurately representing CSM forces than any of the CSM rules.
Other posters seem to have some good ideas regarding Warband origin + something else.

You bring up another good point.

A system like Brian is describing neatly side steps the issue of being someone who wants to play as, say, Word Bearers, but is frustrated by having to deal with one or more editions worth of sub-par rules. You can pick something else to represent them.

I mean, we can argue you can run your Word Bearers as Ultramarines in a casual game if you wish - they're your guys. But some people don't want to do that. Or put up with the eye rolling you might get from an opponent. In the UK, if you're attending a GW run event, you have to run your army as the group they're painted as. (Unless their event rules have changed from the last set I saw pre-covid).

 StrayIight wrote:

 Gert wrote:
The issue with WB specifically is that all of the things they are known for (Dark Apostles, Possessed, summoning Daemons) everyone else can do anyway. On top of that their Legion trait is just flat out garbage. Honestly I'm not 100% sure how I would fix all the issues but as it stands the Legions are a worse choice than Renegade Chapters and the Loyalist Codex gives better options for accurately representing CSM forces than any of the CSM rules.
Other posters seem to have some good ideas regarding Warband origin + something else.

You bring up another good point.

A system like Brian is describing neatly side steps the issue of being someone who wants to play as, say, Word Bearers, but is frustrated by having to deal with one or more editions worth of sub-par rules. You can pick something else to represent them.

I mean, we can argue you can run your Word Bearers as Ultramarines in a casual game if you wish - they're your guys. But some people don't want to do that. Or put up with the eye rolling you might get from an opponent. In the UK, if you're attending a GW run event, you have to run your army as the group they're painted as. (Unless their event rules have changed from the last set I saw pre-covid).

as I said I'd also have legion orgin rules in this system so obviously some legioons are gonna be better then others (you also have relics, stratigiums etc) but you'd at least ave a liittle more flexability so even if the word bearers specific stuff sucks, you might be able to find something that works for you.

The optimal case would be a trait determination system based on tiers:

Step one:
Origin (legions or Renegades) +

Step two:
Alegiances (all marked, monomarked, non marked) +

Step three:
Warband doctrine (reavers, ex companies of legions , order tactic)

Indeed since it's a pile it should come with some negatives aswell, like restrictions to certain units. Or indeed, dare i bring it up, slap a points cost on it? Like a certain other tiered list did...

Not Online!!! wrote:
Indeed since it's a pile it should come with some negatives aswell, like restrictions to certain units.

Oh no. No, no, no. You put restrictions in there, then people will circumvent the entire system by choosing the restrictions that don't impact them in any way.

"Oh no, I can't take Raptors if I take this rule? Fine by me! I wasn't taking Raptors in my list anyway, so I don't lose anything."

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Indeed since it's a pile it should come with some negatives aswell, like restrictions to certain units.

Oh no. No, no, no. You put restrictions in there, then people will circumvent the entire system by choosing the restrictions that don't impact them in any way.

"Oh no, I can't take Raptors if I take this rule? Fine by me! I wasn't taking Raptors in my list anyway, so I don't lose anything."

And so what. the issue with restricions being circumvented was less the fact that people could do it but rather that the units they did circumvent were pointless and offered nothing, hence there was no opportunity cost associated to it.

take raptors as an exemple, nobody gave two gaks about them for most of their existence, because they were just that bad. Hence why a restrictions on raptors didnt hurt anyone... ergo the restriction was basically a free upgrade.
But then again since GW anyways nowadays hands out free upgrades because GW is stupid in that regard why even bother.

Not Online!!! wrote:
And so what.

So what? It's a terrible way to write rules, that's what's what! You shouldn't intentionally create such badly designed rules.

Not Online!!! wrote:
the issue with restricions being circumvented was less the fact that people could do it but rather that the units they did circumvent were pointless and offered nothing, hence there was no opportunity cost associated to it.

So, you agree with me then. 'Cause that's what I just said.

Not Online!!! wrote:
take raptors as an exemple, nobody gave two gaks about them for most of their existence, because they were just that bad. Hence why a restrictions on raptors didnt hurt anyone... ergo the restriction was basically a free upgrade.
But then again since GW anyways nowadays hands out free upgrades because GW is stupid in that regard why even bother.

Again, that's what I just said. Why would you want that to be part of the rules?

Why would you want to create a system that allows for its downsides (ie. the balancing mechanics) to be circumvented?

You could roll for them, much like we often do with Burdens/Damnations on Knights. Pick your Benefits, but the penalty is random at the start of the game. You might get lucky and get something that doesn't affect you (essentially a design issue at that point), but you can't cheat the system altogether.

That or write better penalties. Make them affect values that are common to the game, rather than affect a specific unit:

'The first successful save roll each of your units makes each turn, always counts as failed'.

'If a units total wounds falls to below half it's starting value, it suffers a -1 penalty to all its hit rolls'

Just examples, but generic enough I can't see it being trivial to circumvent them.

 StrayIight wrote:
You could roll for them, much like we often do with Burdens/Damnations on Knights. Pick your Benefits, but the penalty is random at the start of the game. You might get lucky and get something that doesn't affect you (essentially a design issue at that point), but you can't cheat the system altogether.

I'm loathe to add yet another system of dice-rolling to an already massively top-heavy game, but yeah, that could work.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
And so what.

So what? It's a terrible way to write rules, that's what's what! You shouldn't intentionally create such badly designed rules.

The system isn't bad though. to the contrary a system that includes restricitons on unit types can facilitate and accomondate assymetrically balanced games quite well .... IF the core line is balanced good enough.

Not Online!!! wrote:
the issue with restricions being circumvented was less the fact that people could do it but rather that the units they did circumvent were pointless and offered nothing, hence there was no opportunity cost associated to it.

So, you agree with me then. 'Cause that's what I just said.

No i disagree with you insofar as restrictions are bad design, they are not. The problem with them is the baseline as to what get's restricted and what doesn't.

Not Online!!! wrote:
take raptors as an exemple, nobody gave two gaks about them for most of their existence, because they were just that bad. Hence why a restrictions on raptors didnt hurt anyone... ergo the restriction was basically a free upgrade.
But then again since GW anyways nowadays hands out free upgrades because GW is stupid in that regard why even bother.

Again, that's what I just said. Why would you want that to be part of the rules?

Why would you want to create a system that allows for its downsides (ie. the balancing mechanics) to be circumvented?

Because the circumvention should have an opportunity cost associated to it. If i circumvent raptors f.e. as IW and profit from better tanks the fact that i lack Raptors should put me in the mobility department into an disadvantage, an disadvantage which i need to circumvent via play and i should feel that.
The problem is, raptors were so bad and still are so bad, that not picking them is virtually BETTER in all lists. That isn't an issue with the system of restriction but rather an issue of the underlying unit design and faction design, which allows me to not have opportunity costs in regards to mobilty as an IW player in such a hypothetical system, because there's no opportunity for raptors to shine, ergo their "potential" value is 0, making the opportunity cost of picking IW 0.

Maybe instead of restrictions on what units you can take, there should just be downsides that come with the upsides, like in HH. Night Lords get A Talent For Murder, but that's offset by Nostroman Blood and Seeds of Dissent, which are downsides.

Or you could tie it to Not Online's "Step 2" for Marks. If you go All Marks, that's your advantage: you get your basic Legion abilities and get to choose the best Mark for each unit to optimize it. But no other bonuses. If you go Mono-Mark, then you get additional bonuses for patronizing that one particular Chaos God, but the Mark won't be as beneficial for all of your units. Khorne, for instance, wouldn't do much for shooty units. If you go No-Marks, you can choose from a list of additional benefits, just like not taking a Mark in 3.5 allowed you to take multiple Veteran Abilities instead of just one.

Of course, that would require making Marks more impactfull. They need to do more than just grant access to 1 strategem, 1 psychic power, and one icon. They need to have intrinsic benefits themselves.

I was thinking about something along the lines of this:

Replace the <Legion> keyword with <Warband>.

To gain Warband traits first select an Origin which would be one of the 7 Legions (maybe 5 if WE and EC get bumped up) or Renegade Chapter.

An Origin trait will be something like "<Warband> units in a detachment with the IW Origin may ignore the effects of Light Cover when shooting an enemy unit" or "Enemy units within 3" of Infantry/Biker/Helbrute units in a NL detachment must subtract 1 from their Ld when making Combat Attrition checks".

Next, choose a Tactics trait. This would be something like "Masters of Deception - <Warband> units in this detachment gain the benefit of Light Cover if more than 18" from an enemy unit" or "Daemonologists - Add 1 to the Strenght/Toughness/Attacks characteristic for <Daemon> units in this detachment. Only one characteristic may be chosen per detachment."

Obviously, this is just spitballing and is in no way near balanced but you could still get the basic ideas of the Legions/Renegade Chapters while also allowing the player to have freedom in creating their Warband. An IW detachment would still have their affinity for ranged combat but at the same time could be Daemon summoners or a NL detachment would still be terror troops but could gain stealth or combat buffs as well.

I get the feeling the CSM codex will have custom warband rules like the other codexes. So your Chapter / Dynasty / Order / Forgeworld has two traits with each trait being an option to take for the Custom Chapter/Dynasty etc. Sometimes the traits get watered down, sometimes a custom trait is extremely valuable like the Obsec one for Necrons.

If they go that route you could pick a Thousand Sons trait and a Red Corsairs trait if you wanted to run pirate sorcerers. The problem would be ensuring that legion traits (and their custom derivatives) are about the legion's fighting style and not a boon from a specific Chaos god. I suppose they could play the "this clearly nurgle trait cannot be combined with this other chaos god trait", but I'd prefer if the Legion traits focused more on the Legions fighting style with their Chaos gifts/allegiance as the icing on top. After all that's supposed to be why CSM are so dreaded right? All the benefits of a Space Marine with the corrupting power of Chaos on top of that.

Here's hoping they bring back Chaos Mark bonuses as a way to make CSM troops stand out.

 Gert wrote:
I was thinking about something along the lines of this:

Replace the <Legion> keyword with <Warband>.

To gain Warband traits first select an Origin which would be one of the 7 Legions (maybe 5 if WE and EC get bumped up) or Renegade Chapter.

Suggestion? Just to make some of the keyword targeting of things like strats, powers, etc, work better, keep [LEGION], then have [WARBAND] (or [TACTIC]) as a second variable keyword.

Same general principle - [LEGION] becomes one of n options (where n is lower than 9, but includes "Renegade Chapter"), then your [WARBAND] or [TACTIC] pick gives you some flavour (and, presumably, also access to strats, special equipment, or whatever).

The combinations would need some testing, of course, and you might have to stop some combos, but it is a framework that could work.

Do people really want CSM to be the only codex that has drawbacks in their chapter tactic equivalent

 Arachnofiend wrote:
Do people really want CSM to be the only codex that has drawbacks in their chapter tactic equivalent

But how else will they continue their eternal penance for the 3.5 dex that completely definitely brought Warhammer to its knees and shut down competitive play completely for an entire zero days?

 Arachnofiend wrote:
Do people really want CSM to be the only codex that has drawbacks in their chapter tactic equivalent

Solid pass on adding drawbacks outside of "if your army is World Eaters you can only use Mark of Khorne".

 Gert wrote:

 Arachnofiend wrote:
Do people really want CSM to be the only codex that has drawbacks in their chapter tactic equivalent

Solid pass on adding drawbacks outside of "if your army is World Eaters you can only use Mark of Khorne".

Yeah, I second that. GW is already too quick to hamstring CSM with weird, unhelpful rules that are almost openly antagonistic to the people playing the army. No need to encourage them.

The loyalist system works pretty well. I don't really think there's a need to make it any more complicated or different than what they have. "Here's a set of main, "Named Legions" (IW, BL, WB, etc.) and their doctrines/relics/abilities, and here's a set of doctrines and abilities to make your own theme. Whether it be a small warband or a splinter from a legion.

Also - I know this was discussed earlier in the thread, but too often I hear "But no CSM armies operate like full legion anymore!" followed by someone (sometimes even myself) saying "No. These handful of Legions still operate at that level", but really, both arguments are bad.

A full Legion is colossal by modern 40k terms and even includes Titans, Naval ships, IG, the works. Plus many many more marines on top of that than, say, a chapter? If all it takes for loyalist marines to get doctrines is to be at CHAPTER strength, then we don't even NEED to meet the "Legion" threshold. You just need around a 1000 marines (give or take) and some vehicles. Is anyone seriously going to argue we can't meet that requirement?

 Gert wrote:
Solid pass on adding drawbacks outside of "if your army is World Eaters you can only use Mark of Khorne".

I'd be fine with that as a drawback if Marks actually did something beyond adding another keyword.

WE already have to take everything with MoK and it isn't a drawback at all since it's free.

Or if it doesn't involve stupid limits about khorne stupidly only wanting to kill things in melee. I'm dreading a theoretical WE codex and getting hit with the rule: 'Durr, durr, berserker: lose all guns, havocs, oblits, etc.'

Khorne needs to go back to old fluff, where he's perfectly happy with snipers, guns, and any manner of killing. And daemons and marines updated accordingly.

I very much doubt that GW would start adding in restrictions at this stage for sub-factions, especially when the game is very loose when it comes to army building. Unless every single faction in the game was getting similar drawbacks then it would be super unbalanced and unfair.

 Gert wrote:
I very much doubt that GW would start adding in restrictions at this stage for sub-factions, especially when the game is very loose when it comes to army building. Unless every single faction in the game was getting similar drawbacks then it would be super unbalanced and unfair.

On the contrary, GW is excellent at changing horses mid-race. If someone gets it into their head that they need a sub-faction paradigm shift with Codices moving forward, then that's what we'll get.

The fact that it'd be Chaos bearing the brunt of it would be utterly unsurprising.

 Arachnofiend wrote:
Do people really want CSM to be the only codex that has drawbacks in their chapter tactic equivalent

Well the general sentiment is that loyalists should have them too.

I think the current chapter tactics for space marines makes a good jumping off point for CSMs.

As it stands, importing the loyalist chapter tactics wholesale to CSM alone would make a marked improvement on the current CSM rules. It it were simply a copy and paste of the loyalist tactics I think the various legions and war bands could be pretty well served.

If we take the SM tactics as a starting point, then a fixed 2 part rule like for the named space marines chapters would work as legion traits (not necessarily the exact same 2-part rules, Night Lords for instance might have part stealthy, part fear/leadership debuffs). This would represent legions/warbands which follow closely to a particular archetype.

A system similar to the loyalist successor chapter system of custom traits where you can mix and match 2 abilities would be available if you wanted your army to deviate from the legion archetypes. (Possibly with a similar requirement of identifying a named parent legion).

Separate from the legion traits, as with other factions, CSM would have a special rule for playing mono-faction like SM doctrines. This is where I’d put the Marks of Chaos. If your whole army shares the same keyword for a chaos god they would receive this bonus rule. There would be 5, one for each god, and a fifth for undivided.

This would allow you to mix and match legion traits while having a separate unconnected bonus based on a chaos god.

As for an equivalent to super-doctrines, I’m not sure how that should work.

 The Red Hobbit wrote:
I get the feeling the CSM codex will have custom warband rules like the other codexes. So your Chapter / Dynasty / Order / Forgeworld has two traits with each trait being an option to take for the Custom Chapter/Dynasty etc. Sometimes the traits get watered down, sometimes a custom trait is extremely valuable like the Obsec one for Necrons.

If they go that route you could pick a Thousand Sons trait and a Red Corsairs trait if you wanted to run pirate sorcerers. The problem would be ensuring that legion traits (and their custom derivatives) are about the legion's fighting style and not a boon from a specific Chaos god. I suppose they could play the "this clearly nurgle trait cannot be combined with this other chaos god trait", but I'd prefer if the Legion traits focused more on the Legions fighting style with their Chaos gifts/allegiance as the icing on top. After all that's supposed to be why CSM are so dreaded right? All the benefits of a Space Marine with the corrupting power of Chaos on top of that.

Here's hoping they bring back Chaos Mark bonuses as a way to make CSM troops stand out.

Yes, Marks should definitely do more than just add a keyword and give access to a stratagem, psychic power, and icon. They should give a bonus just for being there. But it should also be a viable option to take no Marks. CSM aren't just feared for the powers granted to them by the Chaos Powers, but also because of the fact that most of them are very experienced warriors who have been fighting for a long time, and know how to do it well. Those CSM that don't worship the Chaos Gods should still be a terrifying proposition for their opponents.

That's a great point I hadn't considered. What would you suggest as a benefit CSM with no marks?

I personally prefer static bonuses but GW's current design trend usually goes "oh let's just give them a unit specific strategem"

 The Red Hobbit wrote:
That's a great point I hadn't considered. What would you suggest as a benefit CSM with no marks?

I personally prefer static bonuses but GW's current design trend usually goes "oh let's just give them a unit specific strategem"

Bring back Veteran Abilities. They could work like Dark Eldar Combat Drugs. A selection of optional bonuses that you can choose from or roll for. Or purchase with points.

Isnt Mark of Chaos Undivided the equivalent of having no Mark?
I always tought Chaos Undivided represents both extremes, Word bearers worshiping Chaos as a Whole and iron Warriors or kight lords kinda being there, using Chaos as a tool and just admitting his existence.