The last two dataslates have been pretty disappointing as predominantly CSM fan. I was really hopeful in the last that GW might realise that just because GW are a slow elite infantry army with poor secondaries a modicum of survivability might be in order and maybe something like AoC would come back? At least v shooting? Or there might be a buffs to units like Raptors which haven't seen play even in old better and seem even worse in comparison to the amount of free stuff there loyalists cousins get. Sadly this wasn't the case, at least GW has been consistent with CSM relative power level, very little whiplash in their time in 5,6,7,8th and 9th edition - outside of a brief, beautiful spell in Nephilim its hard to argue against them being amongst, if not the worst armies in that duration?
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| Two Chaos Demi-gods clash on the Battlefield as Abaddon takes on Belakor. |
But thankfully enough time had passed for my interest to renew - returning readers may notice this is a new site (thanks to Wix adding a pretty harsh storage limit - old site can be found here for those interested with lots of other 8/9th edition tournament reports.) Whilst Disciples of Belakor were fun I'd lost interest in Daemons, they certainly fun and a powerful option in current meta I felt the list I had for them was fixed for my playstyle and I felt like changes were forced as a result. World Eaters were fun, if a bit limited in playstyle but if nothing else a lack of available models held back tournament aspirations with the Eightbound being harder to locate than an interactive Eldar list
Anyway - all the above led me back to CSM, for one last hurrah before 10th Edition comes (and yes the preview for them does look very cool.) With Noise Marines feeling very expensive and Bile tuned down massively (probably the only CSM nerf that felt apt) it was time for something new, and my attention turn to the one CSM unit that had got noticeably better - the Legionnaire squad getting almost entirely free upgrades outside of marks. With this idea set, the aim was to get 6ish of these squads loaded up and set forth. Word Bearers and Emperors Children were my initial legion of choice as I messed around with the idea - with Legionnaires able to essentially take 2 powerfists in the squad and having 7 attacks with them as a result something to help with the -1 to hit was key. Emperors Children were the early front runner - at with Icon/Legion trait hitting allowing the fists to hit on 2 and move and shoot the free heavy weapon I toyed with the idea as having them as cheaper noise marine squads, trading some firepower for extra combat output. Combined with EC combat prowess it felt good, but Secondaries become such an issue with Long War and Adorn the Canvas Eclectic in the same category it was hard to score points and I wasn't confident in post-AOC of disrupting primary in the same was as in Nephilim. WB were tempting a good secondary and re-roll hits but I become worried about lack of fight phase control, if I was worried about not being able to make multiple charges into another combat army it felt like that could be game losing.
After toying with literally every other Chaos Legion (Nice defence from Alpha Legin/IW, less need for fight phase control with Creations of Bile, reach from RC and even Night Lords to stop things falling back) I came round to Black Legion. They had three key advantages -
+1 to hit v closest target really helped the powerfists in combat, and meant that I could feel free to load up on heavy weapons > short range melta/plasma to cancel out the movement penalty.
Heralds of Doom - BL strat to turn off obsec in 6 aura to turn off obsec.
Abaddon - I've got on the record in the past as saying he was overrated massively at 300 points in non- BL Chaos Armies (and Knights), but there's no denying his power in Black Legion. What he gave me, more importantly that his killing power was the ability to charge into a second unit in the knowledge that he could tank the interrupt - the killing power and re-rolls were essentially bonus's.
From there the bones of the list was sorted - only question was what unit was going to take the Black Rune of Damnation. Terminators I've always valued less than Chosen point for point and Chosen were my first thought until I was speaking to Gummer who reminded me about Chaos Bikers - another unit I've always been disappointed by in previous Chaos lists. However the change in meta and Abaddon's re-rolls did change this. Given Mark/Icon of Tzeentch to give the Bikers AP-1 shooting, then putting Daemon Shells for another AP and putting full re-rolls on top gave me a unit that really could turn on the damage, gave me a unit could project a huge threat if needed (especially turning them to Red Corsairs for a turn to advance/charge.)
Venomcrawlers are one of the few CSM units that a just great on rate, and really benefit from +1 to hit in both combat/shooting - one of the first adds to any CSM list I mess around with regardless of legion and then its the simple case of how many Legionnaire squads to add. Then it was a case of how many Legionnaire squads, and it was very much a case of go big or go home, so I went with 8. No point going half hog here, lots of trading pieces and enough spare to do objectives. Squads have a split of 4 Lascannons/2 Melta to try and pop transports and 2 Reaper Chaincannons to try and soften up light infantry at range. Probably should have dropped a squad or two for a Rhino but felt like no sense going half measures at this stage. Add in a nasty tooled up Daemon Prince/Master of Possession for secondary access and support spells and list ended up like this:
Was hopeful for a 2-1 at RTT to consider the list a success, don't think its likely to be a top tier army, but it felt like it actually had some real teeth to it when it was put together. With someone mixed expectations ended up at the excellent Tabletop Republic for the RTT.
Game 1 - Secure Missing Artefacts v Davey Liddle's Gorgon Tyranids
My Secondaries - The Long War, RBD, Engage on All FrontOpponents Secondaries - Cranial Feasting, BEL, No Prisoners.
Pregame thoughts: So as a general rule my pregame thoughts for both my time as a CSM and Daemon player could be summed as more aggression all the time. Different times, different list, different situation now. On positive side - Nids secondaries were such that I didn't need to worry about having to dominate primary to such an extent and could rely on more of a trading game especially as they had to at some point take the initiative with there more aggressive secondaries. On my side RBD/EOAF were a natural combo - whilst it was going to be hard to max they felt combined with putting 2 squads in strategic reserves a good way to force Nids forward. This was especially important given how bad Abaddon is at pushing into Nids - the Winged Hive Tyrant can solo him easy enough and even his phase caps would be pushed to limit by a units like a potential high rolling Carnifex and the Foot Hive Tyrant given there ability to damage in the charge phase - I really wanted to counter attack rather than be the aggressor so I could surround him with models stopping the charge. Nids held a big speed and durability advantage, and arguably a ranged one two albeit not great at chewing through multiple infantry squads outside of the Pyrovores. Plan simple - try and deny primary, trade cheaper units into more expensive ones and hope Nids would have to force pace were a big counter attack would win game.
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| Chaos deployment, Marine squads hiding close to the walls, Bikers get premium hiding position and Abaddon is surrounded by bodies next to the Prince to block the Winged Hive Tyrant from charging. |
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| Tyranids deployment, big bugs in the middle with Hormagaunts clinging to the walls. |
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| Reverse shot of Nids deployment. |
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| Reserves on both sides - 2 Legionnaire squads for me, Tyrannocyte loaded with Pyrovores for Nids. |
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| I've had bad luck with Venomcrawlers exploding on my army in the past, this game started a trend of them at least 6 from Abaddon at all times so they can't explode on him. |
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| Was happy to lose the roll of and let Nids get first turn as there big bugs starts to move up. |
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| Chaos well hidden with only the Shardgullet Tyrant only able to get a few shots in to a Venomcrawler |
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| Pyrovores deep strike in, they can't get targets but the overwatch is enough to threaten the objective. |
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| Chaos move up in response. Bikers with full re-rolls move up and take out a Carnifex and the Venomcrawlers soften up Pyrovores in a mostly cautious advance. |
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| One squad of Pyrovores is taken out in shooting. I charge 2 Legionnaire squads in, one to take the overwatch which gets horribly incinerated. The other squad gets in and kills 2 more to leave with the objective and tripoints the last one to try and be a pain. |
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| Going into Nids turn 2 - both Venomcrawlers take a round of Shardgullet shots but some good invulnerable saves keeps them both in the fight. |
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| Carnifex's and Venomcrawlers advance up to the south and line up shots into my bikes but fail to do an damage of note. |
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| Carnifex does murder my last Legionaire to retake the objective before overrunning upfield to make it harder for the bikes to get into the fray as Hormagaunts take my objective but fail there charge into the Venomcrawler. |
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| End of my turn 2 as I have an excellent turn. The Bikers buffed up again shoot down another Carnifex and charge the Tyrannocyte just killing it to clear the objective. The Prince whiffs a bit against the Carnifex and takes some serious damage back despite what should be a awkward profile but with the Venomcrawlers up top clearing the first wave of Gaunts I've taken a good lead on attrition damage even if score is deadlocked. |
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| Nids starting to run out of assets before Chaos which means the Winged Hive Tyrant has to commit to the fight before Abaddon |
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| Nids have a pretty strong response but they are out of reserves. Gaunts take the objective up top and the Venomthropes take out my Prince. The Carnifex battles the Venomthrope to a draw using imperatives to fall back and charge. Hive Tyrant takes battle to the bikes, killing several but they take out a significant chunk of flesh in return and hold the objective.... |
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| .....at least until the morale phase, despite being immune to combat attrition a dreaded double 1 after the morale see's the last 2 flee and gives Tyranids a big boost. Annoying I had forgotten about Mark of Tzeentch passing first fail saved all game! |
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| Despite the setback Chaos were still in a strong position, with most threats to Abaddon out the way/engaged he finally takes to the battlefield. |
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| Up top a Legionnaire squad and Crawler combine to repulse the Hormagaunts. |
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| Early screening had kept my reserves at bad, but with Nids running out of bodies they pop in and a meltagun shot takes out the last few wounds on the Tyrant. |
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| Chaos start to take full control - behind the top right L another Legionnaire squad has arrives for RND/EoF and threatens the Nids home objective. |
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| Skipping a turn - Nids leave there home objective guarded only by the Hive Guard and a combination of Powerfist and Heavy Chainaxe clears them from the objective. |
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| Despite it being their priority objective Nids have run out of bodies to contest south right objective. |
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| Blurry shot - the last Hive Tyrant takes out the Venomcrawler/Legionnaires at the top as Nids scramble for points. |
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| Abaddon channels his inner Red Corsair and make a long charge into the Hive Tyrant at the end to cap a Chaos win. |
Final score - Chaos win 86-60.
Postgame thoughts - Very happy, game went largely to plan. Was very concerning keeping around 700 points of Abaddon/bodyguards stationary for first few turns but the early trading went well enough that Nids weren't gaining a lead on primary and secondaries were slowly going in my favour. Was happy to go second - Long War is so much easier and the army isn't really quick enough to do get any angles turn one outside the Bikers who probably have to overcommit. Speaking of they were excellent - they chew up a lot of resources but there ability to take out Carnifex's at range and nearly take out the Hive Tyrant dictated the early tempo - I didn't really have any good other answer in list to these other than Abaddon and his speed/worry over the Winged Hive Tyrant meant he had to be very cautious. Still a good start to the day.
Mission two - Data Scry Salvage v Luke Lee-Brewins Tyranids
My Secondaries - The Long War, Despoil Dominions , Engage on all Fronts, Opponents Secondaries - Banners, No Prisoners, Engage on all Front.
Pregame thoughts - Data scry always a tough mission, the nature of it can really result in some epic games or a complete blow out. Against Gorgon Nids for the second time in two games with less of a threat from reserves and two bulky Tyranofex's to bully the middle instead of Carnfixes. Much less threat range from this list - lack of any long range shooting out the Shardgullet Tyrant and no Winged Hive Tyrant meant I could be big more aggressive with some units, even if Abaddon was still vulnerable with Nids still able to phase cap him over enough phases that I couldn't be aggressive with him. Plan was similar to previous game - trade, go slow and try and draw out big beasties into Abaddon range and allow him to counter attack which. Given I thought I'd struggle to hold objective in the middle for banners went with Despoil Dominions - similar to one of the Sisters secondaries it awards 4 points for doing an action in no mans land objective, 1 point for objectives in your own deployment and completes end of your turn if its a troops units which you may have noticed I have plenty of.
Postgame thoughts - Ending up a comfortable enough win, albeit with a few scary moments. The Bikers and Crawlers were great at setting up tempo early on and running Nids out of resources that meant Engage in particular became a real struggle whilst the more disposable Legionnaires often managed to help the score ticking over for CSM whilst denying Nids primary. Its a very odd match up - the multi-phase nature of Nids (and there ability to turn on the mortals in particular) makes Abaddon feels like such a liability, but his re-rolls boosting the bikes in particular in return makes them such a threat in Nids side that they struggle to answer.
Game 3 - Conversion v Lewish Smith's Daemons
(No I haven't figured a way how to make multi-page lists show smoothly on here yet, its a work on for next time)
My Secondaries - The Long War, Despoil Dominions, Engage on all Front
Opponents Secondaries - Reality Rebels, No Prisoners, Assassinate.
Pregame thoughts - So this felt like the Warhammer version of bumping into your ex seeing Disciples up against me, especially at the same venue were I'd started my Disciples of list. Secondaries were interesting - I hadn't planned to take Engage 3 games in a row, but 3 Caster heavy armies had left my Warp Ritual plan in tatters - I almost didn't end up casting any spells with the Prince in any game as a result. However thinking before the game I was happy enough that the secondaries slightly favoured me - Reality would score heavily, but No Prisoners and Long War/Despoil would probably be tough and I was happy I could make up the gap with Engage v Assassinate to keep the game focused on primary which was important as I did have a large obsec advantage here. The issue was that the Disciples were much more trade focused that the versions I had been focused - things like Flesh Hounds out traded my Legionnaires and Daemons had a real speed, durability and damage. However I felt there was always a chance that a Daemon low roll could be critical - there wasn't a lot of obsec in the list and even something like Belakor had a reasonable chance of leaving a lone Legionnaire on and objective to swing it my way. I was hopeful as well the Bikers would be a greater counter to the Daemon Prince (overly so as it turned out.) Was going to be hard match up unquestionably, the Daemon stats were considerably above what CSM could produce (they had just smashed there way through a Emperors Children list the game prior, whose fight phase tricks I'd have loved to have) but it seemed like a decent match with the close nature of the map meaning I had areas to stage towards the objectives.
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| CSM win first turn - Venomcrawlers start moving up as its hopefully hard for Disciples to remove if I apply the -1 damage strat. |
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| Bikers and Lascannons peek out to take some pop shots at Belakor. The Dark Master mostly shrugged off the damage taking 4 wounds. |
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| This was intended to be a pic of the Nurglings hiding in the back in the ruin. Sadly I missed them completely so lets pretend this is a shot of the 2 Fiends and Bloodletters the Daemons had in reverse (along with flamer squad.) |
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| Daemons hide at the back preparing to counter attack the CSM advance. |
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| Try and soften up the Nurglings enough for a Crawler to charge in and finish them in combat, sadly I fail the charge. I debate re-rolling the charge (7/8ish from memory) as killing it in combat would grant 3 Long War points, but I elect not to and keep enough CP to threaten an interrupt instead. |
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| Pretty poor turn 1 for CSM, had hoped to do a bit more damage to Belakor and meant both Secondaries and Primary are a bit harder. |
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| Flamers teleport in to my right Flank - I'd hoped its T7 might allow it to tank them and take the objective but one squad take it out by themselves. |
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| Fiends and Flesh Hounds prepare to charge the Venomcrawlers after a nasty Cacophonic Choir deals 6 mortals to the middle crawler. Combat is a mixed bag - both Crawlers tank the charge but struggle to deal any damage of note back. |
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| Chaos turn 2 - going first I can't be as cautious with the Bikers, with full wound re-rolls and chainsword they remain a threat to Belakor in combat. I commit forces to my top left flank to take out the Fiends |
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| Two Legionnaire squads commit to the middle, one to take out the Flesh Hounds, the other to Despoil the objective. |
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| Right flank is a immediate issue with the Venomcrawlers despise. I send a Legionnaire squad in to take out the last Nurgling and they pile into Flamers to try and limit back. |
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| Daemons turn 2 as the Torment Bringer moves up, trying to disprove my assertion in my last Disciples article that its something I should consider dropping. |
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| Full on mess of combats break out! So much more epic than pictures of Guard tanks blowing things up from 72 away (The Table next to me Guard had won the first turn roll off and removed Belakor and the phase capped Bloodthirster turn 1 .) |
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| Sideways view of the battlefield - Flamers get teleported out of combat and the Legionnaires quickly meet there fiery end but it at least costs Disciples a CP when the initial cast fails. |
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| Reverse shot from previous photo as Daemons take the fight to my top left flank. |
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| Lots of combats break out - The Flesh Hounds go first and take out my Legionnaires to give Daemons the middle. Bloodletters teleport in defensively to avoid 'Auspex' from Bikers but they hold the CP for interrupt. After Fights last from Belakor is either denied or failed (forget which) the Bikers interrupt against the charging Bloodletters exactly killing them and soften Belakor up a bit before he takes out 2, one of which comes back next turn. |
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| Left flank is going CSM's way - Abaddon and Beleakor clash, Abaddon putting full-rerolls on himself countered by Transhitmen from Beleakor denting his output. Some good saves from the Prince mostly neuter the damage from the Warmaster who gets phase capped but the Bikes roll incredibly on there hit rolls and chip out a large amount from Belakor's health. |
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Reinforcement from outflank arrive. Melta gun takes out a Flamer and to avoid charge from the Prince the Flamers remove the closest to the objective. The Prince changes tact and charges/kills the Tormentbringer and piles into two Flamer squads.
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| I'm stretched to my absolute limit on the right flank, but the Legionnaire manage to survive the onslaught from the Flamers and then completely bounce the Executioners autocannon (who I think did forced 9 saves on power armour over 3 turns and saw 8 get passed.) The Prince denies the Flamers teleport and suddenly the right flank is looking much rosier. |
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| Executioner takes the middle, combat gets off to a bad start as the Fiends Malefic tongues charging in from deep strike take out the Daemon Prince. |
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| Abaddon mostly bounces off Belakors saves again (completely failed to roll any mortals) but the Bikers take out the Prince and the game suddenly swings back heavily to CSM. |
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| Surviving Legionnaires retake the right objective even if they can't kill the last flamer. |
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| Bikers swam into the middle. CSM shooting takes out a few Flamers to limit Daemons damage before routing a Fiend squad and the last Knight. |
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| Daemons mostly forced back into the corner now, although they can teleport out. |
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| CSM take control of the battlefield as the battle descends into a scramble for points. The Master of Possession had moved up to heal Abaddon and Flamers teleport over to murder him. |
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| CSM can't be removed from middle and take the game with Abaddon and Bikers unable to be contested effectively now. |
Postgame thoughts - Phew, on a knife edge in the early turns especially with Daemons scoring Reality Rebels freely and murdering units left and right and it felt like I was struggling to land a big hit in the early turns. Funny how powerful units become when you aren't using them? The Flamers in particular scoring the right flank over and over threatened to decide the game and it took a good roll from the Legionnaire squad mentioned above to stop the flank getting overrun - as it was it ended up contributing very well to me getting Long War points even if attrition went very badly on that flank. Abbaddon was mostly disappointing again - his re-rolls were more valuable than his combat output. He tended to roll very poorly on his initial wound roll, and didn't end up putting any mortals in Belakor which was a shame. Thankfully the Bikes kept chipping away expertly at Belakor and once he got below his first bracket there various buffs made them hard to chew threw effectively especially with Master of Possession bringing them back.
So overall I was delighted with 3-0. Given it was a 24 person event I never held any realistic thoughts of topping the table with CSM secondaries even when making it to the last round undefeated and I ended up taking third as the lowest scoring of the 3 undefeated players - Thomas Douch winning with Guard dropping only 4 points across the 3 games and Sid's Chaos Knights taking second with 284 battle points before dropping down to my 263. If it was solely on battle points I'd have ended up being tied for 5th.
So as for the list? I loved it. Certainly has its problems and against a army that doesn't have to commit much to score points like Guard its certainly going to struggle but its multiple squads scores well enough to keep things ticking off points and it can deny primary exceptionally well - as long as objectives aren't too far away. A mission with more passive primary scoring certainly presents a real challenge which might result in having to use the Bikes more aggressively and losing my main source of ranged damage. Bikers with re-rolls were certainly the MVP, they survived all 2/3 games with pretty much full numbers and were incredible throughout. Its a huge investment with Abaddon factored in, but they give the list so much firepower (for CSM at least, can match firepower with a Farseer and Dire Avengers for about 400 points less) and they feel like one of the few units that can go head to head with alot of the other meta threats and repeatedly come out on top - whilst I didn't face any desolators they would struggle to get through the often T6 models with -1 to wound and potential to heal/bring models back.
The other stars were the Venomcrawlers, just awkward to kill and they really benefited from BL trait. I've always tended to find them good but unreliable but with hitting most things on 2's and often getting exploding 6's they turned into excellent Skirmishers and tempo setters and hard to remove effectively.
The Legionarire squads were great - B+ solid effort type unit. The mix of weapons I'd probably consider tweaking - the Lascannons whilst swingy felt like they had the best effect, whilst the melta squads often went in reserve to try and snipe something with a lucky pot shot - swapping them out for Lascannons or Reaper Chaincannons seems very reasonable. The Chaincannons were a bit ineffective TBH, but there a good weapon and probably lacked the critical mass to make a real difference. The squads rarley took the spot light but were vital in setting up the trades and really did enjoy the Legion trait to punch up on several key occasions. I was worried the lack of Slaanesh fights phase jank would hurt them, but in the end I preferred saving the points and keeping them cheap and being constantly struggling for CP meant I'd have to struggled to use the trick effectively. Otherwise there role in denying primary and often adding to secondaries was great, generally excellent work house unit that only the Flesh Hounds/Flamers managed to repeatedly out trade effectively.
The HQs were a mixed bag. Abaddon's re-rolls were unbelievable and game changing to someone who's not had much access to them in the past, but repeated armies with strong casting limited his combat effectiveness. If given the choice I'd have rather had corrupted Vahl/Leontus over to CSM side and used them as cheaper alternatives but there we are. The Daemon Prince remains a expensive beatstick that dies a bit easily even with half damage - I think he's needed for Warpcraft option, but dropping the WL trait for extra CP is certainly a consideration as I really did want an extra CP. The Master of Possession had a pretty 'meh' tournament, but his impact is more felt by what didn't happen - with his buffs on the bikes they tended not to get targeted (and they didn't often give Nids the chance to target them) and in a game were I need to be more aggressive he certainly would have had more value. Great unit, just a mostly unseen job and can function as a backup Warpcraft option when facing less caster heavy armies.
Overall it was really nice to run a CSM list again at a tournament (probably for the last time in 9th), even if they still feel a bit underpowered its always nice to dive back into my favourite faction and spread some glory for the dark gods and they still had a bit more punch than I think people were expecting.
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