No matter which way the fouls winds of the Empyrean may blow, Chaos remains strong and ever stronger. Let the galaxy burn. For more great articles, check out the Tactics Corner.
Units
Like many of the MEQ factions, Chaos Marines got a number of point drops across a variety of units- however, they were also quite a lot less than people were expecting, and unfortunately several of the core units (like Chaos Space Marines themselves) failed to see any improvement, and thus probably will be stuck on the sidelines. However, the good news is that there were a number of improvements to things that mattered, so it’s not all doom and gloom.
The most notable- and most unfortunate- change was to Chaos Cultists, who have gone up to 5pts per body now. A lot of people aren’t happy about this, obviously, but I don’t think it’s going to be a game-changer- Cultists are still a very good horde unit and they are still probably one of the best troop options the army has available. They no longer are mathematically the most efficient source of shooting, but they never really were supposed to be. Cultists will still do what Cultists were always meant for, i.e. screen your characters and other units from the enemy while controlling objectives. Chaos as a whole is still the horde faction par excellance and this won’t change that- it just means that lists bringing 100+ Cultists to the table are going to be less common. (It is worth noting that both the special weapons for Cultists went down in price, which may make the Heavy Stubber actually worth taking now. The Flamer I am still skeptical on, though.)
Two of the other potential troops did get price drops, though- Rubric Marines went down two points and Plague Marines went down a point. Although both of them tend to be better left to their respective specialist legions, they certainly aren’t useless in a CSM detachment and are certainly worth considering. Also note that many of the weapons for both units got cheaper, particularly the “flamer”-style ones- this makes it a lot more plausible to take these guns over some of the other options.
A number of the HQ choices for the army also saw cost reductions, mostly the Terminator versions of various characters. The Terminator Lord (-10pts) and Terminator Sorcerer (-18pts) are both pretty significant drops, which I think gives them some mileage compared to the Jump Pack versions of both characters while still retaining that all-important ability to come in from reserves when needed. The Warpsmith also came down a total of 15pts, which I believe now makes him the cheapest HQ option for a CSM army- and, it should be noted, he still comes with a Meltagun, Flamer, and Power Axe, plus the ability to repair vehicles or deal mortal wounds to enemy vehicles. While it won’t push him to the top of the list of choices, I think there’s enough utility there to really consider taking him if the rest of the list warrants it; unlike a Techmarine, the Warpsmith can still do a lot of work even when none of your own vehicles have been damaged and you shouldn’t underestimate the power to throw out mortal wounds while also doing some good shooting and melee.
Many of the named HQs also came down in price, although in some cases this was because they were hilariously overcosted. Cypher is now 80pts, which still isn’t good but at least is something like vaguely non-horrible; Fabius Bile and Huron also saw big drops, though I doubt anyone will bother do try either of them. Kharn saw a massive 40pt drop, bringing him down to 120pts- with his ability to dish out a large number of high-strength high-AP swings, I think he could possibly be a solid inclusion these days, though delivery remains difficult. Still, a potential fourteen attacks on the charge (and more if he’s fighting loyalists) at S6 AP-4 is pretty nasty, and while he doesn’t do a very good job of giving out rerolls, that’s a fairly minor point. Lucius the Eternal also came down to 85pts, which makes him… well, a basic Chaos Lord on foot, I suppose? You could do worse.
Aside from the basic slots, many of the daemonic vehicles received points drops as well, though mostly fairly small ones. Sadly, the Forgefiend, Maulerfiend, and Defiler are all still quite bad, as they die easily to dedicated anti-tank weapons while being fairly unimpressive in damage output themselves due to low weapon weapon skill and ballistic skill values. The Helbrute fared a little bit better- it got a flat 12pt reduction to its chassis and almost all of its weapons, both melee and ranged, saw reductions of varying amounts; most setups will be anywhere from 20 to 30pts cheaper, depending on exact details. I still don’t think this makes it broadly viable, but certain variants may have a place; the Sonic Helbrute in particular seems like it just might be good enough to give a spin, as double-firing all those multiprofile weapons can be very powerful. The Heldrake could also possibly see some niche uses, as it got an 18pt price drop and was already on the border of being good- a 30″ movement with the ability to assault can cause problems for gunlines and with careful positioning you can often lock down a horde unit while taking minimal damage yourself from the return swings- and, of course, since it flies you can escape from combat easily and continue shooting as needed.
Several of the other MEQ chassis went down by decent amounts- Raptors, Possessed, and Chosen all dropped by 2pts per body. I think it works out best for Raptors, as several of their special weapons got cheaper as well and reserve abilities are innately useful; Chosen still suffer from issues with getting into range, all the more so because of the nerf to Forward Operatives. Warp Talons and Chaos Bikers both dropped by 3pts, but seeing as both of them were extremely lackluster to start with, I don’t think that helps enough- though Bikers might have a place in certain lists, as they carry a lot of guns for a not-unreasonable price. Chaos Terminators also dropped 3pts, and I feel like they are perhaps the most likely to actually see some use out of it- earlier on in the edition there were some lists that used Slaanesh Terminators to drop in and vaporize something with rapid-firing Combi-Plasmas twice; though you can’t use Warptime to do shenanigans there anymore, a higher prevalence of infantry targets out there makes them potentially a lot more useful again, and if we see a decrease in some of the multishot Dmg2 weapons out there (looking at you, Imperial Knights) that could help a ton as well.
Chaos Spawn are the final unit I think are worth pointing out- at 25pts per model, with a potential squad size as low as one, they are an excellent slot-filler in a brigade and can be surprisingly dangerous once in combat. S5 AP-2 Dmg2 attacks are no joke, and it can put out a significant number of them; the various mutation bonuses similarly can increase its damage output by a goodly amount as well. While their defenses are still paper-thin, a few solo Spawn roaming about the field can give your opponent a real headache when they start tying up vehicles or pouncing on wounded characters.
Oh, the Chaos Land Raider came down in price a lot as well, but the things that make it bad aren’t just limited to its cost, so it’s still not worth using.
Wargear
Tons of different weapons got reductions for the CSM codex as part of Chapter Approved, since GW re-evaluated the balancing of many weapon costs across the whole of the game. As many of the Chaos units have some of the most flexible weapon loadouts available, this is good news for them in general, as it makes a lot of the potential setups a lot more useful. Flamer weapons, for example, saw drops of 3pts (for basic and Combi-Flamers) and 5pts (for Heavy Flamers), Melta weapons went down by 4-5pts, and even Plasma weapons saw drops of 2pts. With many CSM units able to cram large numbers of special weapons onto their models, these can lead to some very significant drops in overall price even beyond the raw costs of the units themselves. For many units this still isn’t enough because they need a way to get in range to use these weapons effectively, but for those with good movement (e.g. Chaos Bikers) or reserve abilities (Terminators, Raptors) I think it might have some possibilities.
Several heavy weapons also saw such decreases- the Autocannon went from 15pts to 10pts, and the Missile Launcher from 25pts to 20. While the latter is more typically used by loyalist armies (especially Ultramarines ones), the Autocannon is largely the sole purview of CSM and has at various points in the past been a significant force in the meta. Havoc squads with four Autocannons are no small threat to light/medium multiwound targets, and with Knights generally expected to lower in popularity somewhat in the coming months, it’s not unthinkable that such a unit could present a very real threat to many units out there- especially since CSM gets a cheap and effective double-shooting stratagem.
The Power Fist also got a 3pt price drop, which ends up being very nice for CSM; lacking access to the Thunder Hammer, they have to get by on its weaker companion, so a cut in points makes it a lot more feasible to take on general-use squads here and there. The Chainfist saw an even more massive point, down to just 11pts; I think that makes it the superior option to the Power Fist where you can take it, although it’s still not as good as a Hammer because an extra point of damage is way better than an extra point of AP. A few other more specialized melee weapons also dropped (such as the Thunder Hammer and Power Scourge on the Helbrute), but I don’t think those will change most people’s choices.
Of the other generically-available weapons, the Havoc Launcher (for vehicles) came down 5pts; it’s still not an option that will blow you away, but it does make plating on the extra weapon to your vehicles a bit more attractive of an option, as it’s not a bad profile by any means. Reaper Autocannons also came down in price, but Reapers are terrible even with the changes, so there’s basically no incentive to take them still.
One small bonus for the Forge World side of things: although most units didn’t change much, the Butcher Cannon (available on a couple platforms, such as the Hellforged Contemptor) dropped by 20pts and the Butcher Cannon Array went down even more, going down to 40pts per weapon (from 80.) As the Hellforged Leviathan was already generally seen as a pretty solid unit thanks to its durability, firepower, and being able to benefit from Legion abilities, this is a major boost to its usefulness. It may not be a top-class contender, but it’s definitely something worth thinking about, as it gets you quite a pile of wounds with T8 and 2+/4++, not to mention BS2+.
Allies and Meta
This is probably actually the biggest alteration for CSM; while the codex itself isn’t really all that much stronger (except a few specialist builds), Chaos Daemons as an option got some significant boosts and it’s now much more viable to bring them as an ally. Daemonettes, for example, are down to 6pts per model- only 1pt more than a Chaos Cultist. While there are certainly still advantages to the Cultists (shooting attacks, Tide of Traitors, etc), the Daemonettes are looking a lot more attractive as an option now. Similarly, quite a number of daemonic units can down in price, some of them by as much as 30% on both large and small units.
In fact, I would go so far as to hazard a guess that there is some sort of “fast daemonic monsters/vehicles” army hiding somewhere in all of these points changes. I’m not sure if it’s a good army by any means, but with many of them seeing point drops of 10-30% of their total cost, it may be that there is something to it. Heldrakes, Helbrutes, Plagueburst Crawlers, Seeker Chariots, Hellflayers, Bloodthirsters… that is a lot of scary units to be tossing into the enemy’s face, and all of them rocking a 5++ (better with buffs) means the enemy won’t be easily able to sweep you off the table. Again, it’s purely speculative, but I think it’s something that could be experimented with and it has a lot of potential tools in its arsenal.
Death Guard and Thousand Sons also both saw some significant drops to their respective cult troops (Plagues, Rubrics) as well as a number of the subsidiary units. Although the “prime” choices didn’t change any, such as Daemon Princes or Plagueburst Crawlers, the increase in scope of units that can be considered playable or even good as allies is definitely a boost to the Chaos faction as a whole and a big help to Chaos Marines in particular, who can mix quite well with the other types of traitor marines due to the ability to mix stratagems with them.
The shift towards more infantry targets could also be very beneficial to Chaos, depending on the exact details. CSM have some incredibly efficient horde-clearing units in their pocket, not the least of which being Noise Marines and Berzerkers- and the things that either of these units can do to a big horde of Orks or Genestealers are pretty disgusting. CSM are well-equipped to take out both elite and horde infantry, and that’s just with the tools their typical lists were bringing to the game already- to say nothing of if they decide to take more specialized ones.
Final Thoughts
I think the big take-away from all of this is that while Chaos Space Marines can consider Chapter Approved something of a sidegrade for them in terms of just the raw functionality of their codex, the options for allies have expanded so drastically that I think the book is in a much better place overall. Chaos soup armies had already been performing quite well before any of these changes, and while they can’t spam out quite as many bodies as they could before due to bumps in price to some of the horde infantry, none of those options became unusable and several other good options have been opened up. While some of the choices (e.g. the Land Raider) are still pretty bad, far more of them were brought in line with the direction the game is heading in general and have made a lot of choices that were formerly just a complete trap into legitimate options for building an army list around, either competitively or for more casual play.
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I remain salty that a BS3+ Sv5 Astra Militarum Vet is now the same cost of a cultist. Not mad at the cost of cultist per say but I have yet to hear a believable rational behind regular IS remaining 4 points, Vets brought down to 5 points, and Cultists bumped up to 5 points. Even with Tide of Traitors, etc. I feel like Cadian IS and Vets outshine Cultist by a wide margin.
Basically, cultists can be in units up to 40, while AM vets can only go up to 10. That means each buff you have on them is 4 times as efficient. 40 cultists with +1 to hit re-rolling 1s +1 to wound shooting twice and a 5++ fnp is something completely possible and brutally efficient that will put heavy damage even on tough targets. That’s why AM have their horde unit (conscripts) cost as much as regular guardsmen.
The Orders system is also very efficient and flexible (rerolling all failed To-Hits if they don’t move by default, access to +1 to-wound through stratagems as well), plus there is some answer to the larger units by being able to blob up IS units using a stratagem. Both AM and CSM Cultists have strong hoard toolkits, it’s just hard for me to not put them on the same level in my own mind because they seem very comparable.
>Even with Tide of Traitors, etc. I feel like Cadian IS and Vets outshine Cultist by a wide margin.
I definitely understand the feeling, but I think that tournament results are pretty inarguable in saying otherwise. Horde-heavy Chaos lists have been doing very well, and are arguably on par with the current builds of the Castellan list due to being able to double-shoot with heavily buffed units, spam Smite, etc.
This is the thing people seem to miss.
The “feel bads” are on the points, and then they try and compare just the datasheet, but in practice 40 Cultists are never the same as 4×10 Guardsmen. They’re regenerating, teleporting, 5++ FNP, double shooting, +1 to wound, morale immune blobs.
Just like you say, tournament results almost universally prove that Cultists > Guardsmen when not comparing them in a vacuum.
You know, basing the cost of a unit on the assumption that it is always heavily buffed doesn’t strike me as a good design. Although I suppose it says more about the state of the game than about the update.
Not taking into account the possibility of a unit, especially when it’s almost always taken that way in application, also seems like poor Foresight.
They didn’t anticipate Brimstone horrors being taken by the hundred when they had a 4++.
They didn’t expect smite to be everywhere when it had no limit.
They didn’t expect giant 2++ Bullgryn balls.
We make all sorts of changes based on the possibility, as to control it.
The buffs available to a faction are absolutely important to how powerful a unit is. It’s not the raw stats of a Dark Reaper that make it powerful- it’s the potential to shoot twice, rerolling all misses, rerolling all failed wounds, and then immediately ducking back out of line of sight that makes them good.
A Cultist, by itself, is not really much different than a Kroot Carnivore- in fact, it has a worse statline and a worse weapon. But the large squad size combined with powerful stratagems and psychic powers as well as auras makes the two units work _completely_ differently on the table, which is why you see Cultists winning major events and Kroot sitting in the bargain bin.
Will have to tinker with a new CSM list. Actually liked using raptor units with 3 plasma/ melts when 8th ed dropped, maybe that’s coming back. Also I already liked maulerfiends before, they work well in a target saturation list,now they’re even better. I agree with you that a chaos list with a lot of heavy hitting multi wound models could be interesting now, got so many reductions across the board.
Yeah, it just… feels like there has to be something there, you know? Unfortunately a lot of versions will struggle with terrain due to the big bases on many of those models (especially restrictive terrain like ruins), but depending on your local setup it might be fairly viable.
I also am kinda half-expecting to see someone bring triple- or sextuple-Bloodthirsters to a tournament and really go nuts with it. Or possibly run into 200 Ork Boyz and die a miserable death, but you never know.
Justin Curtis is currently testing 3BTs + primarchs so probably
4CP is more than enough for anyone, I bet. 😛
About Cultists
Regenerating ok, with Tide of traitors
Morale inmune blobs are affordable with the Iron warriors warldord trait
I generally don’t bother with Cultists in +1 to wound and double shooting, I generally use those stratagems either on Noise Marines or on Oblits, depending of what target I need killed ASAP
5++ FNP with the Slaanesh psychic power, but perhaps it would be more useful to protect more valuable units in your army
But how do you teleport cultists?
but t
“Teleport” was used loosely. Tide moves them, Alpha legion can infiltrate them.
Hell, I suppose you could dark matter crystal them if you wanted.
When you tide of traitors them you can set them up within 6″ of any board edge.
There’s no doubt that 10 cultists are worse than 10 guardsmen at 4ppm and certainly worse than 5ppm vets. Yer 30 cultists are better than 3×10 Vets. I think the most direct fix is a sliding cost scale.
The more models you take, the more they cost. The first 10 cultists cost 4ppm, 11-20 cost 5ppm, 20-30 cost 6ppm, 30-40 cost 7ppm. So 20 cultists cost 90, 30 cost 150, and 220 for 40.
Orks too, as 10 orks just don’t do much since they rarely benefit from mob rule and don’t benefit from Green Tide. They should be 6ppm for 0-10, 7ppm 10-20, and 8ppm for 20-30.
In fact, I think most horde units would benefit from this pricing – pink horrors, Conscripts, termagants, genestealers, grots, Tzaangors, etc.
The main reason why you see competitive solo-Space Marine lists and no solo-Chaos Space Marine lists is that the Space Marines get reroll all wounds or get reroll wound rolls of 1 in both shooting AND close combat, while Chaos only gets it in close combat. Outside of shooty Space Marines, you don’t tend to see a lot of solo Space Marine lists. Well, same for Chaos, except they can’t quite do that. Nothing wrong with Chaos Soup, and as stated, there are bits and pieces of Chaos that work, but Chaos Space Marine as a mono-faction are pretty much dead.
My pre-CA 2000 pts CSM list actually got 35 points more expensive. I feel like I got to rethink my entire list to stay relevant since most of my opponents now can fit additional goodies in theirs.
Unfortunately not much in the CSM codex looks that appealing to me. Helbrutes, Defilers and Spawn got cheaper but not sure they´re good even with the price drop. Gonna have to start looking at allies I guess. Sad because I´d prefer a pure CSM force.
I mean, the reality is that any faction that _can_ ally really should- Imperium does it, Eldar do it, and Chaos should as well. And that seems to fit with what GW wants the game to be like and the fluff of the world- the Traitor Legions typically work to bring in daemonic allies, etc. You certainly can play without using these options, but it does hurt your potential.
That said, if you dislike the idea of turning to Chaos Daemons for options, don’t forget that you can bring other legions of Marines as well- not just Death Guard and Thousand Sons, but also alternative legions from within the CSM book also. I can’t really say in specific what would help you without knowing your list, but there are a lot of good options there.
I agree with this – I think competitive CSM got worse, while casual CSM got a lot better.
I understand why Infantry Squads didn’t go up, even if GW wrote the reason for Cultists going up a point was due to wanting more diversity in CSM lists, with the Loyal 32 being the most common single unit combination on the competitive scene. The meta they were looking at was the early post-IK meta, so prior to Castellan/Loyal 32/Smash Captains, where IFs weren’t as prevalent. Obviously, they look silly now and it really shows why GW should move to a web-based system for points and rules instead of an annual points adjustment.
My salt is reserved for the meal that is Terminators. Loyalist Termies are 5 points cheaper than CSM Termies, and ours can’t take SS/THs.
Warp Talons got a solid point cost reduction that doesn’t fix them – their problem is the same as the Land Raider: terrible rules. They now cost less than a CSM sans wargear. Enemy units not getting Overwatch against them the turn they Deep Strike is a great way to terrorise Tau players, but zero charge modifiers outside CP re-rolls leaves them still too expensive once you drop 2 LCs on them.
I am thinking some AL PMs might work with the point drop.
I actually think Chaos Terminators are significantly better than the loyalist ones (and the DG/1KSons ones are even better still.) The ability to take Power Axe/etc rather than the more expensive Fist is pretty big, as is the option for Combi-weapons and the myriad buffs that can be applied to them.
And yeah, Warp Talons suffer a lot from not having a good way to enable their charge. None of the legions help them at all in that respect, and with rule of 3 you can’t bring enough squads to have a reliable chance of getting the charge off the turn they arrive. I’m also not thrilled with the numbers on LCs overall, although they aren’t actually terrible or anything.
Great article, keep them coming. Not sure how relevant it is to the current meta but the Kytan Ravager dropped just over 100pts. It might be a little late to the super heavy knight party, but with a non-degrading BS/WS, ability to receive warp time, and re rolls to hits and wounds for 1 CP might be useful in a CSM list that was looking to use a chaos knight distraction anyway. It costs pretty much the same as a chaos knight with a similar load out.
The Kytan is… interesting, but still not good, I don’t think. Its most relevant use might be to enable a detachment with Morty/Magnus/Kytan combined so that you can get some CP out of your remaining two, though honestly I don’t think that’s the “right” way to build that army anyways. Still, nice to see that they brought it at least somewhat more in line with the others.
While i dont like that Cultists are more expensive than Guardsman, i can understand especially when all abilities and potential is taken into account.
What i dont understand is how basic chaos space marines and loyalist marines didnt get a points change. I understand their weapons got changed but terminators, veterans/chosen, primaris/cult marines all got points drops in addition to their wargear.
Its like GW is trying to move away from those units being on the tabletop when every other choice is better/more points efficient.
I agree- I think they needed to change something with the basic MEQ chassis, and they didn’t. It’s very unfortunate, because I would’ve loved to see the various Marine units in the codex get a boost.
That’s absolutely it. They are encouraging their new toys (cough cough Primaris) and I think you’ll quickly see at least the rules and point costs for traditional Marines be outclassed and stay that way.
Doesn’t really make sense for Chaos, though, as they don’t have any Primaris and many of the things that got cost drops aren’t fancy or new at all (such as the Daemon Engines, some of which date back to 4E.)
I’m sure GW’s gonna come up with some sort of “Fabulous Bile reverse engineered the secret to making primaris marines from captured prisoners and is now selling them to every legion who wants some” event one of these days.
They’ve already hinted that he’s working in that direction. It’s gonna happen at some point.
Why is the Kytan still not good in your opinion?
The Kytan is close to a Renegade Knight in some ways, but it also has a lot of weird quirks to its abilities and statline. If you compare it to the Avenger Cannon version, it has fewer wounds (by two) and one more attack; its main gun has only eight shots (vs 12), but has the higher strength. However, it lacks the Flamer and Stubber that the Knight carries, and more importantly cannot Rotate Ion Shields (or any equivalent).
That’s not to say the Kytan is without advantages; it hits harder in combat for the most part, and it does have access to the various CSM stratagems that can be very nice- however, without the survivability that Rotate brings, I don’t think I can call it quite as good overall. The point drop makes it an acceptable unit, maybe even decent, but I would be hesitant to call it a good one.
I expected you to mention that, unlike a Renegade Knight, the Kytan cannot Fall back and shoot+charge in the same turn.
Comparing both the Kytan and a Rengade Knight I prefer the versatility the Renegade Knight offers over the Kytan. It’s good to see that you agree with me
That is a thing as well, although throwing down fifteen attacks most units don’t actually stay in combat with a Kytan all that long, and unlike a Knight it’s shooting isn’t actually so impressive that you’re necessarily losing a ton by sticking in a fight. It’d be nice, of course, but I haven’t seen it be as much of a problem.
That skill is very useful when fighting hordes.
In my last battle against green tide orks with 3 battlewagons and no significant shooting, I had my double thermal cannon knight charged by 30 orks (my bad to allow that 30 Orks to da jump into my rear and reach my knight). That 30 Orks reduced the knight from unscathed to 10 or so wounds left (2nd tier damage table)
Because I had another tools in my army to deal with that 30 boyz, I had my knight disengaged, to damage considerably a battlewagon with its guns, and then stomp over a deffkilla wartrike. In that situation, I couldn’t engage the battlewagon and the deffkilla wartrike in another way
I’m not saying it’s trivial, it’s more that the Kytan’s lack of a truly powerful gun means disengaging isn’t nearly as strong as it is for most of the Knights. Having the rule would be useful, obviously, but I don’t see it as a dealbreaker.
I think bikes at 23pts a pop (incl combi weapon) are fairly reasonable options. Cheap objective takers that can run around grabbing objectives and put out a decent amount of bolter shots.
Thanks for the review!