Monday, April 21, 2014

Chaos revisited

So I've been thinking about starting a Chaos Space Marines army lately so I've been cruising a lot of blogs and sights that talk about the Chaos Space Marine codex. Surprise surprise (Well okay not really a surprise) there's a lot of talk about how bad the codex is. You get that with pretty much any codex out there and Codex Chaos Marines is no exception. For the most part I ignore it and read what, if anything, else the article has to say. Found some interesting lists and thoughts. Then I went to check my blog roll and I was checking out a post by Virtual Stranger over on the Grim Cheapness where he was talking about embarking on a new project to build a paper hammer knight titan and then to make it Chaosy... you know because Chaos gets crap extras. He had a link to a blog run by a friend of his that explained the point of Chaos getting crap. Out of mild curiosity I followed it and checked it out. It's the standard "This is why Chaos Space marines" suck start but he did something most other people I've seen haven't done: Made reasonable suggestions as to what to do in order to address the issues raised and then explained his reasoning for those points. And there wasn't anything terribly radical about his suggestions and they didn't revolve around "World Eaters should have this" or "I can't make an Emperor's Children army because of that" either which was a real surprise. Anyway, check it out. I won't re-post what he's already gone over.

What I will do is talk about what I did with the information he posted. I took his suggestions, grabbed a digital copy of the Chaos Codex, grabbed some additional art work, loaded them into Photoshop and went to work to craft a revamped army list using the information that Marcus the Blackheart posted. So I present to you the army list for revamped Codex: Chaos Space Marines! Right click and select "Save as" to download.

the revamped Codex: Chaos Space Marines.
Basically the pages in this file would replace the HQ, Elites and Troops section from the normal Chaos Space Marines codex.

The only thing from Marcus' suggestions that I changed was I created a new unit, Chaos Legionaries. Basically, these are Marines who have been around since the heresy but don't fall into the category of being Cult marines, or Chosen. They're still more or less what they were when they were part of their respective legion.

I haven't had the chance to start play testing the changes yet, but I'm gonna try once I get the Chaos Models to put on the table. In the mean time, if any of you want to give it a whirl and post your thoughts on the changes here, I whole-heartedly encourage you to do so. Rest assured I will read the comments and take them into consideration when and if I make any edits to the file.

4 comments:

  1. I'm re-posting this comment I left over at Atomic Warlords:

    I would add one more thing: if your Warlord is marked to a specific god, those marked Elite units (Zerks, Plaguers, 1k Sons, Noise) are unlocked as troops. Really tired of paying the Chaos Lord tax to field a Nurgle DP and Plague Marines as troops. Makes no sense that a DP doesn't unlock these units as troops.

    BTW, the guys that run the BAO and LVO are thinking of giving Chaos Marines (the unit) ATSKNF in their tournaments. Also, they may change Champ of Chaos so you don't have to challenge.

    Aside from my addition above, you guys hit all of the issues I had with the codex right on the head. Excellent work!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I can understand your point, but I have to say I disagree with the suggestion. In a Chaos Space Marine army it does makes sense that a Daemon Prince doesn't change the army. If you look at the fluff there are three ways a daemon prince is depicted.

      1- As a character that is about to ascend to Daemon hood. So he's not actually a Daemon prince yet. He's still a Chaos Lord and mortal.

      2- A Daemon Prince that has already ascended and has mostly left his old army behind. Sure he fights besides them, and he functions as a major vessal of destruction in support of them. But he's really not in command of anything.

      3- and idol, or deity of worship. In this capacity he's much more of an item then a character. A rendition of a diety to use to cow others into submission. Again, the Daemon prince isn't actually commanding anything.

      The rational behind unlocking Possessed as Troops in this rendition is that as daemonic entities the Possessed are drawn to beacons of power such as a Daemon Prince, so the army or force that the Daemon Prince is fighting along side can have more possessed then other armies.

      Delete
    2. OK, I get the fluff reasons though I'm not at all into the fluff. I'm just talking game design. By what you're saying, it shouldn't actually BE an an HQ choice, then. Just seems dumb to me that an expensive HQ like that doesn't allow that particular unlock yet it still takes up an HQ slot. Make'em Heavy or Elite or something and let me take a Lord and a Sorcerer for HQ and a DP for some other slot. CSM is a very restrictive book because none of the units really work well together... not like Tau, or IG(AM), or Eldar, etc. Virtually no synergy here.

      Thanks for this post, too, BTW!

      Delete
    3. Yeah when the Chaos Daemons book had Daemon Princes in the Heavy support section I thought it was a sign that they would be moving the Chaos Space Marine Daemon Prince out of the HQ section. Have to admit I'm more then a little surprised that they didn't. Still, moving it to say the Elites does change the army list, and makes other changes.... will have to think on that. You might be on to something.

      Delete