New Chaos Decurion

Hi fellow citizens of The Dark City. The new Chaos Marine Decurion formation has been leaked at http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/325127-chaos-new-rumors/page-31#entry4491113 (I am not sure if I am allowed to post this link, Mods please remove if required).

So now that Chaos has a few new shiny formations (the Heldrake formation looks brutal, and the core formation has lots of Termicide units), how long before we get our turn at the table?

-Fisheyes

We can but hope that this is indicative of GW realising that some armies are simply unable to compete with the big boys and that if they want to sell models for those armies they need to sort out their rules first.

Count Adhemar, I highly doubt GW is unaware of this. It just appears not to affect their sales to the point where they feel the need to do something about it (quickly anyway).

These formations seem to be overall fairly balanced with a few gems hidden throughout. It will be "fun" to play an endless swarm of cultists, although it does take away from the Nids (but they should be right behind us for the Decurion).

It seems like it will do a lot for them competitively.

It can't get worse and I actually them. Now I'd only need new chaos Marines models but I guess I'd buy betrayal at Calth for that.

Most of the Formations are a lot worse than our Coven supplement. There are one or two that are ok-ish but the rest is straight for the thrash can.
Helldrake formation looks brutal? The fun thing is one of the formation boni is unusable as the situation just can not happen in a game.
Most of the stuff in the book is poorly designed and not nearly on the same power level as the top armies while also using weaker models.
Warpsmith tax in nearly every formation (which is double the cost of a techmarine while not even repairing as good or having any options) and if you stop and say "wow, this one looks good" you realize that they managed to completely disappoint you after you read the formation rules again.

Example?
Raptor Talon.
Raptors and Warptalons assaulting from DS. Sounds amazing. It might be a proper risk vs reward decision (you are pretty likely to mishap or scatter out of assault range as csm have no locator beacons) and it is overall nice. Until you get to the point where it is a disordered charge and your dedicated assault troops have the same kill potential as a devastor space marine coming out of a skyhammer drop pod and assaulting instead of shooting - all that while the dedicated shooty marine does not have any risk at all (mishap protection, moving an additional 6")

Another example would be the cult of destruction. Shooting twice per warpsmith sounds great.
Until you realize that you can not use the same weapon again but have to shoot the same target and can't use any of these weapons again next shooting phase.

The Fist of the Gods formation is a carbon copy of the loyalists formation. Loyalists get +1 repair (so they repair on 4+ or succeed automatically - depending on servitors) and are immune to shaken and stunned.
Traitors get +1 to repair (so they repair on 4+, no way to improve it but the warpsmith is twice the cost of the techmarine - with the same stats of course) and a 6++

All in all there are about 1 or 2 formations that are not terribad. These are still nowhere near competitive but they are not as bad as the rest. And then there is the hunting pack which gets its redeeming quality solely from the ability to spam Maulerfiends.

Chaos can already spam Maulerfiends with KDK lists.

But we get HATRED and avoid free double fool proof roll on the chaos mutation table.

And the grav Marines from the loyalist formation can be shot at and attacked. The warp talons and raptors can be locked in combat and survive shooting.

I'm actually a bit curious what they thought about the Hell Drake vector Strike rule. Is there actually a way to use it despite an enemy unit fleeing?

Count Adhemar wrote:

Chaos can already spam Maulerfiends with KDK lists.

With KDK lists, not with CSM lists.
Thas like saying "Dark Eldar can alreads spam wraithknights with Eldar lists."

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But we get HATRED and avoid free double fool proof roll on the chaos mutation table.

The same Formation grants loyalists ObjSec on everything and free vehicles.
Mutations are pretty poor. Neither Soulburn nor +1S to your bolt pistol or hatred (yet again) does anything on a single model.
Yes, you can beef up your juggerlord. But that is like getting a poisoned sword that kills everything it touches and adding another coat of poison to it.
The best thing you can do is pick a cheap cultis champ and hopw for ascension/spawndom. The rest is pretty meh.
Also hatred is only against 50% of the armies. Thats a pretty poor formation bonus if you fight Eldar or Crons.

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And the grav Marines from the loyalist formation can be shot at and attacked.

No. skyhammer allows them to attack after deepstriking without having a disordered charge and without having to riks a mishap.

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I'm actually a bit curious what they thought about the Hell Drake vector Strike rule. Is there actually a way to use it despite an enemy unit fleeing?

Simple... they didnt think about it.

Klaivex Charondyr wrote:

Count Adhemar wrote:

Chaos can already spam Maulerfiends with KDK lists.

With KDK lists, not with CSM lists

Hence me saying "Chaos", not "CSM".

Chaos also contains Chaos Daemons which is a pretty competitive army. You do not play Chaos. You also do not play Imperium.

Klaivex Charondyr wrote:

Chaos also contains Chaos Daemons which is a pretty competitive army. You do not play Chaos. You also do not play Imperium.

And yet if I said "The Imperium can spam drop pods" this would not be an inaccurate statement.

Count Adhemar wrote:

Klaivex Charondyr wrote:

Chaos also contains Chaos Daemons which is a pretty competitive army. You do not play Chaos. You also do not play Imperium.

And yet if I said "The Imperium can spam drop pods" this would not be an inaccurate statement.

Not by the letter but in a discussion about Imperial gaurd formations it would be way off topic.

Klaivex Charondyr wrote:

Count Adhemar wrote:

Klaivex Charondyr wrote:

Chaos also contains Chaos Daemons which is a pretty competitive army. You do not play Chaos. You also do not play Imperium.

And yet if I said "The Imperium can spam drop pods" this would not be an inaccurate statement.

Not by the letter but in a discussion about Imperial gaurd formations it would be way off topic.

Except I can make a KDK list that spams Maulerfiends using only models that appear in the CSM codex. I couldn't do that with Drop Pods and IG.

It seems that most people immediately go to the Raptor formation. What I see here is a decent mid-tier set of formations that allows you to do some nice MSU tricks.

What I see is:

Core:

-Juggerlord

-Termicide with combi melta

-2 CSM squads in rhinos for the dringe caster

-Bikes with melta

-Havocs with ACs

-A million single units of spawn for maximum MSU


I think this would do some damage at low points, and should give you room to fit in a few heldrakes or whatever.

The unending swarms of cultists seem to be custom-made to go with Typhus. Infinite number of plague zombies with Fearless and FNP will be hard for anyone to get rid of.

Yes, the cultist swarm does look good. I believe you can try to turn your cultest sargent into a DP with those free double Boon rolls each turn. And dont forget that everything is ObSec if in the Decurion

fisheyes wrote:

Yes, the cultist swarm does look good. I believe you can try to turn your cultest sargent into a DP with those free double Boon rolls each turn. And dont forget that everything is ObSec if in the Decurion

I thought it was only the Chaos Warband that gets ObjSec?

fisheyes wrote:

Yes, the cultist swarm does look good. I believe you can try to turn your cultest sargent into a DP with those free double Boon rolls each turn. And dont forget that everything is ObSec if in the Decurion

Only the Warband gets ObjSec.The cultists are an ok formation. It is the cheapest core by far and with an added Typhus (as long as they do not FAQ him from "army" to "detachment") and Necrosius (Furious Charge for all Zombies) they can get quite annoying.
Try to get your champ into a spawn or DP and you add a lot of value.
Ok but no eye opener. There are not many armies out there that have problems dealing woth them and the 4+ roll is pretty hit or miss.
Better use the unending horde from the Vraks book that gives you renegades back (with all equipment) on a 2+ and they may outflank too.

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Except I can make a KDK list that spams Maulerfiends using only models that appear in the CSM codex. I couldn't do that with Drop Pods and IG.

Which still makes it a KDK army and no CSM army. I can play a full bike SM army too but that does not make them Dark Angels.

Actually these also gain outflank.

The Red King wrote:

Actually these also gain outflank.

But they come back on 4+ and have no real options. Getting large Renegade units with special weapons and upgrades back on a 2+ is more reliable and point efficient.

I really dislike formation rules that may or may not come into effect. Thats why Hatred: imperium, random mutations and any rule that depends on a dice roll are strictly inferior to straight up boni.

Klaivex Charondyr wrote:

Which still makes it a KDK army and no CSM army. I can play a full bike SM army too but that does not make them Dark Angels.

Which might be slightly relevant if I'd said that they did.

Hmm, I expected a greater reaction from my fellow True Kin. Its true that these are not Eldar (or even SM) level formations, but they are certainly mid-tier, and worth considering using over a CAD.

I for one, will be quite happy once we get ours, even if its at this power level. Even with our terrible book, I still generally win/loose games against competitive lists by only 1-2 points...

I personally do like them for the most part. It isn't cheese level and nobody likes to be part of the "tone it down" wave (who knows that better than us) but I think all in all it is pretty fluffy. It exemplifies the nature of a chaos warband with its main bonuses being to the powerful ones who bring all these disparate pieces together into a coherent fighting force. I don't think that the gladius should be handing out free transports, free stuff is the antithesis of balance but from a fluff perspective it makes sense. Loyalists are more tactically focused whereas chaos is a little more top heavy.

Guys, you know what? I secretly hope that we don't get new content until 8th edition drops. Every time a new edition comes around it changes up the game in a major way and with that changing how good/bad every unit is.

I would rather have some new releases after 8th edition, which are hopefully designed to fit right into the new rules, than get some content before 8th edition, just for it to suck again when the new edition comes out.