[Androxine Vortex]

Alrighty then, so I've decided to swear my fealty to the dark gods and will be playing a Chaos Space Marines army. As the title says, I am a newbie. I have very little understanding of rules though i do have an old rulebook that a friend gave to me from his battle of macragge set. There sadly aren't any gamesworkshops near my house so I will have to see about finding local hobby stores to play at. I think for starters I'm going to just make a 500 pt army and then work up to a 1000 pt. I want my army to be good for casual play and just having fun but at the same time I want it to be "competitive" enough to win!

So I've got a couple questions to ask:


1) I really love the Word Bearers, they have always been a favorite of mine so I think I will make a WB army. Now, just because they are word bearers would it be ok to use icons of slaanesh, nurgle, etc. in that army?


2) I really like the model design for the Chaos Sorcerer with the staff. But suppose for my HQ I wanted a Chaos Lord. Would it be alright if I used a sorc and told my opponent before the battle I am using a Lord, that I only used the Sorc for his looks? And could the same be said if say I wanted the "sorcerer" to be just say Typhus for example. As long as I let my opponent know, would it be a problem?

3) I really like the idea of having one color scheme but will also vary the individual models abit (so maybe this one is red, silver, and gold while another model is red, silver, and black) but I also really love the iron warriors and black legion. Do you think it would be ok if maybe two or three of my foot soldiers wore the black legion color scheme but maybe had their helmet and right shoulderpad painted red to symbolize them joining?

4) As I mentioned above, I really like units that look cool (hence why I love Chaos) but I hear a lot of people saying that if you use a Chaos Lord you should put him on a bike. Honestly, I think bikes look dumb but are they really good in the game?



5) Those were just some basic questions I had. Now for the real big decision: How will I build up my army? I understand that some armies have certain strengths when in battle. Tyranids are goodin melee. Tau are good as shooters. But how does Chaos work? From a beginners perspective, it appears that Chaos has a lot of customizable options and armiescan be built in different ways. You could have a raptor heavy army focusing on close combat or have lots of havocs and shoot from afar. I just don't know how I want my army to function.

I don't want to just grab handfuls of random units and toss them out onto the battle field. I want to have a good strategy and understand how my army works. I'm not even sure which HQ I should start with. I'm also not sure if I should invest in heavy support like hellbrutes and defilers, or use fast attack support. So is there any advice you can give me?

I don't have a ton of cash (curse you college!) so it might take some time to get my army rolling. Oh and also, I see on games workshop's website that some units they usedto have aren't there anymore (like a certain chaos sorcerer that had the two dragon/serpent shoulder pads) This guy...
http://ralakan.com/epgp/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/P1010002-7.JPG

are there placesyou can still buy these?

 

[neferhet]

Alrighty then, so I've decided to swear my fealty to the dark gods and will be playing a Chaos Space Marines army.

YES! Praised be the Dark Prince Slaanesh!! Welcome to the Chaos Club, have a cookie.

1) I really love the Word Bearers, they have always been a favorite of mine so I think I will make a WB army. Now, just because they are word bearers would it be ok to use icons of slaanesh, nurgle, etc. in that army?

perfectly safe to do that. Also, word bearers are perfect when represented by the "Crimson Slaughter Supplement". Basically, in that book, you have all the tools to get a proper WB army: possessed, unholy crozius, preachers, etc.

3) I really like the idea of having one color scheme but will also vary the individual models abit (so maybe this one is red, silver, and gold while another model is red, silver, and black) but I also really love the iron warriors and black legion. Do you think it would be ok if maybe two or three of my foot soldiers wore the black legion color scheme but maybe had their helmet and right shoulderpad painted red to symbolize them joining?

the good thing of csm warbands is that you can do wathever you like. in my legion i actually have some black legion troopers fighting along my main force. nothing bad with that: alliances and such.

4) As I mentioned above, I really like units that look cool (hence why I love Chaos) but I hear a lot of people saying that if you use a Chaos Lord you should put him on a bike. Honestly, I think bikes look dumb but are they really good in the game?

Yes they are good. Are bikers the one and only way to play a Lord. No it's not. Take the model you like more and try to maximise it's use on the field. We can help!

Then, about army composition:
for 500 pts you can start with a Terminator Lord, plain and simple, plus 3 more terminators with combiplasma as retinue, then 20 cultists with 2 flamers as cannon fodder/heretics for the fluff, 5 marines with meltagun & combimelta in rhino and you are ok. A mixed bag army, with "elite" units, cheap bodies, melee capability and some shooting at midrange.

at 1000 pts you could take another rhino with marines like the above, 5 nurgly spawns to add that mutation spicing to the army and maybe lascannon havocs for long range support or, if you like it close and personal, more goddam spawns! BLAAUURRGLEFLSHHH!!

Also, i suggest to build your force starting at 1000 pts. Less points, it's just a kill team.

So at 1000:

Chaos Lord
Terminator armour
boon of mutation (for the lulz)
power axe, power mace
meltabombs
(130-ish)

4 Terminators
4 combiplasma
2 power axes
1 power sword
1 power mace
(148)

5 Marines
meltagun
combimelta
rhino
(130)

5 Marines
meltagun
combimelta
rhino
(130)

20 cultists
2 flamers
(100)

5 Spawns
mark of nurgle
(180)

5 Spawns
mark of nurgle
(180)

something like 1000 pts - using Crimson slaughter, of course, for that extra funny Warlord traits and free "Fear" for every model!

EDIT: actually i quite like this silly list i might try to use it once

 

[Squire]

1. Yes. WB units carrying icons is actually more fluffy than if they weren't!

2. I can't imagine many people making an issue of that

3. I think Black Legion fighting alongside Word Bearers is fine. I reckon the fluffiest way of doing this is a WB dark apostle with his most elite unit (termies or chosen) and a BL lord in the same unit, as a sort of advisor perhaps. As far as my understanding goes the BL are still kind of the leaders of the chaos legions, maybe less so than in 30k but they'd still be the most influential of the legions with tendrils of power in all sorts of places.

4. Bike lords are good, as are bikes. Rhinos aren't assault vehicles, land raiders are very expensive, so how else can you quickly get your lord into combat? That (and the extra toughness) is why people use bikes. There are other options if you don't like the idea of your lord on a bike though- with the mark of khorne you could give him a juggernaut (really boosts a lord's stats), with mark of slaanesh a steed (extra attack, outflank) and with mark of tzeentch a disc. Then if you really don't want bikes at all you could have a unit of spawn accompanying him. A juggernaut and a unit of spawn is quite popular and effective

5. The most popular chaos lists tend to have lots of fast units like bikes, spawn, helldrakes, maulerfiends and infantry in rhinos. You can definitely do effective shooty lists but I think the focus should be as much on mid/short range shooting as it is long range. A chaos marine gunline will get outgunned by armies like tau/imperial guard who can do the same thing better. I think the codex best facilitates balanced lists that can fight in combat and shoot, mostly getting right in the opponent's face to do so. Similar to the more CC oriented space marine armies, or tyranids for that matter.

Read chaos marine army lists (and the comments) on here for a better idea of what other chaos players are doing and what works!