Chaos Space Marines: Checking Out the Raptor Sprue

After a couple of weeks of waiting, my Raptor kits finally arrived. So, naturally, as one does when they've been waiting for three weeks for something they so desperately yearn for, I thought I'd go make a pie, maybe browse MiniWarGaming, do some work on my vocals and do some study. With that all out of the way, it was finally time to sit down and see what's in the box...

So. Many. Bits.

So this is what we got in just one of the boxes. Only two sprues, but they were absolutely packed with bits. Let's have a closer look, shall we?

Legs, Jump Packs, bodies and mostly Warp Talon stuff.

More legs and Jump Packs, as well as all the bits you'll want for Raptors!

Both sprues are about as full as they could possibly be with stuff. The number of Lightning Claws that come in this box is brilliant! I think I have a good 18 of them to use after using one for my Raptor Champ and keeping one for my Lord out of two boxes of Raptors.

The other thing I was actually really impressed with was that while you still only get one of each special weapon (as with every GW kit ever), they actually give you two sets of arms to wield the special weapons with per kit, so that even if you only buy 5 you can still take a Meltagun and a Flamer without searching around for any spare bits or buying anything else. Not that taking 5 Raptors is a good idea though...

So what does that mean for me? It means I'm about half way in terms of Plasma + arms to a Plasma Chosen squad. Definitely stoked.

As for the bits themselves, everything looks fantastic. The detail and number of spiky bits are very chaotic. There's even teeth on the top of all the Jump Packs. There's so much customisation available in the Raptor box. It has to be the most enjoyable kit I've ever got my hands on.

Anyway, after a good 2-3 hours of work, I've got them this far:

Who needs Jump Packs when you've got skillz?

Or heads, for that matter...

I'm leaving the heads, Jump Packs and shoulder pads off them all until they've been painted, as well as the Meltaguns. I realised it'd be too hard to paint after making the mistake of sticking some on without thinking, but oh well, what can you do? And the armless guy is going to be the icon bearer. I'll be using the standard from the Slaanesh Helstriders (or whatever they're called... I think that's it?) which I'll mostly be buying so I can mount my Lord on a Steed of Slaanesh.

So that's it from me for now. If you have any excuse to run some Raptors, I'd definitely suggest it. They seem like they'll be a very good option on the tabletop too. Time will tell...

Chaos Space Marines Codex Review

Well, here's the review I promised! Hope you enjoy it.

Huron got a lot better this edition.

Overall
Overall the book is fantastic and there's definitely going to be plentiful styles and builds for both fluffy and competitive armies. The vast majority of the book is easily worth it and even some of the formerly more terrible units make it into the "useable" zone, including Spawn!

The Chaos Boon Table is fantastic and all 3 gods that use psychic powers get their own psychic tables. Throw in a smattering of Chaos Gifts, some cool new rules and units and you'd be hard pressed being disappointed with the book.

The Chaos Vehicles upgrades are also fantastic. Dirge Caster stops enemy units within 6" from firing Overwatch whilst Destroyer Blades allow you to cause D6 S5 hits to a unit when you Tank Shock them.

Named Characters
There's very, very little to be disappointed about in this section, except for the complete lack of anyone new (no Cypher...). All of the named characters are at least better than they were, though the only ones you might see in competitive lists are Kharn, Fabius Bile, Huron and maybe Ahriman (being the only Mastery Level 4 Psyker currently). Though I do suspect someone will come up with an uber-list with Abaddon and a whole bunch of Chosen, but I'd personally leave him to friendly games.

Back to Fabius Bile: he seems very good now. He comes at S5 with 5 attacks and inflicts Instant Death with his combat attacks, while boasting a 18" Poison (2+)  Assault 3 shooting attack. He also has FnP. Unfortunately though, he's still only Initiative 4 and has no Invul. But ultimately, the icing on the cake is that you can make a single unit of Chaos Space Marines in the same army as him +1 Strength and Fearless for absolutely no extra cost and no negative side effects of any kind. Swap out the Bolters on this unit for Close Combat weapons, give the Champ a Lightning Claw and give them whatever Mark you please, plus the Icon if you feel it's worth it, and you've got yourself a pretty brutal unit. Obviously Mark of Khorne and Icon of Wrath are the obvious choices for the unit, making them an absolute machine in combat. The Champ will be hitting with 5 Attacks at S6, AP3 with rerolls To Wound for the first round of combat. Even Independent Characters are going to fear that should you not feel comfortable throwing Fabius himself in there.

Typhus can make Cultists Zombies if you wish for no cost, giving them Slow and Purposeful and FnP, but they can't shoot. There is a dispute over this though, as the rule states that they may not choose any options, and in the new codex extra models are options, so some could argue that as per RAW you cannot take more than the minimum unit of 10. Whether this was intended or not, we'll have to see. I personally don't think it was meant that way, but I'd still advise staying away from Zombies until the FAQ is released.

HQ
Chaos Lords are going to be king in challenges, and considering they must issue them, that's a very, very good thing. Daemon Weapons still hurt you on the roll of a 1 when determining extra attacks, but the new rules for them a very nice. I don't think I'd use any of them outside of friendly games though. Burning Brand of Skalathrax, the flamer Kharn used when he started attacking his own guys, is also an option. It's a S4, AP3 Flamer with Torrent. I like it plenty. Back to Lords though, my personal favourite current combo is Terminator Armour, Sigil of Corruption, Power Fist/Power Weapon/Pair of Lightning Claw and a Mark of Tzeentch. This gives him a 2+/3++ save and some simple but effective armour-cutting weapons. I'll be rocking the Power Fist myself.

Sorcerers are way cheaper at 60 points, and you can get up to 2 more Mastery Levels at 25 points each for a Mastery Level 3 psyker. All of the god-specific psychic tables are absolutely fantastic, though Slaanesh is so far my least favourite whilst Nurgle's 5-6 option is definitely my favourite. It probably depends on the army you're playing and what kind of Synergy you need though.

It is indeed true that Daemon Princes don't have Eternal Warrior and they cannot be T6 with a Mark of Nurgle. Instead they must be a Daemon of one of the gods, which gives them an ability + Hatred (a certain type of Chaos Daemon here, depending on god). Being Flying MC's though, I think they still have their uses, but they are certainly expensive. I'm not so sure about them yet.

Now onto the new guys, the one's most people are probably most curious about. Warpsmiths seem decent, though I'd only run them as a secondary character after a Lord or Sorcerer is in the list, but the Dark Apostles are utterly lame. Yes, it's crushing, but it's the truth. Everyone within 6" gets to use his leadership of 10 and any models in the same unit that roll on the Chaos Boon Table get to reroll the result. Lame. He also has an AP4 weapon, because we totally need help killing those Dire Avengers and Fire Warriors in combat, right?

Troops
So in the troops section we're left with just Chaos Space Marines and Cultists, both of which are fairly cheap and both of which are definitely going to be making it into 90% of non-themed lists. A unit of 10 Chaos Space Marines can just be given a pair of Plasma Guns at 170 points, or you can completely kit them out with Marks, Icons, Special Weapons and all that jazz and reach over 268 points (though anything over that is probably getting into the zone of "retarded-for-the-sake-of-being-retarded" kits) for the 10 of them.

Meanwhile, 20 Chaos Cultists will rarely be costing you more than 120 points. I'll definitely be running at least one unit in every list I make.

Elites
By golly is the Elites section packed. You've got Chosen, Possessed, Terminators, Helbrute, Mutilators, and the 4 Cult units. Obviously you can unlock one of the Cult units as a Troops choice with a Lord/Sorcerer with the appropriate Mark or the appropriate named character, so I guess that's a mostly moot point.


Every single Elite choice is useable. Chaos Terminators with Power Fists cost 2 points less than enemy shooty Terminators and while they miss out on Assault 2 weapons for inferior ranged firepower, they are more accurate and are the superior choice when within 12" thanks to their now 2 TL shots versus the standard Termies still 2 non-TL shots. I think Chaos Terminators are going to be a good option this edition, either with MoT or Slaanesh and Icon for FnP, however I think the Slaanesh and Icon combo is crazy expensive. I'll probably stick to no mark or Tzeentch.

Possessed are great now, but are still crazy expensive, so it makes it hard to justify them outside of friendly games. The Helbrute is the Dreadnought replacement and is actually useable now. Yay! I'm not too taken by the Mutilators because I think I could spend points better elsewhere, but they're still good.

Fast Attack
Too bad you've pretty much got to take those Flyers to be competitive. They are definitely good, but in my opinion it's either 2-3 or none. One will just get nailed way too fast. You could take a Daemon Prince for your HQ instead of one if you wanted and save some points, but I'd just go with those Heldrakes. Luckily you can also give them Baleflamers and dominate infantry like no tomorrow with those S6 AP3 Torrent Templates.

As for the last FA slot, everything is viable. Raptors are essentially the same before, but gain Fear and are only 17 points a piece. Bikers got the same kind of treatment, and 3 of them with 2 Meltaguns is only 90 points. You could make them T6 for an additional 18 points too, if you so choose. They're definitely a solid unit now.

Then you've got the Warp Talons. As I mentioned in my last post about the codex, they work great with the Dimensional Key. They're a bit like Possessed though; they look great, they beat things down in combat like no tomorrow, but they also cost a huge amount of points. Worth taking, but not tournament material.

Heavy Support
Most of the old stuff stayed about the same, maybe getting a little cheaper. The Predator costs more base but the options are much cheaper. Oblits are 5 points cheaper and have access to Assault Cannons but can't fire the same weapon twice. Nothing really worthy of note with the old stuff except the Havocs, who are the first unit who can take Flakk Missiles. They're S7, AP4 Skyfire and you can fire them out of your Missile Launchers. Unfortunately they come at an additional cost, but I have 2 units of 5 Havocs in every version of my list with 4 Missile Launchers and Flakk Missiles. Combine them with 2 Flyers and the sky is yours. They also make taking the Baleflamer over the Hades Autocannon on your BS3 Flyer a much easier choice. Defilers are also better but more expensive.

The new stuff though... Well the Fiends are both fantastic. The Forgefiend can fire 3 S8, AP2 Blasts per turn at 200 points whilst the Maulerfiend is a Walker that moves 12" a turn and is designed to dominate vehicles in combat. It doesn't have any guns, but it'll wreck anything with an AV value that it touches.

All of the Daemon Engines are incredibly survivable with a 5++ save and the ability to regenerate a Hull Point with It Will Not Die.

Conclusion
Absolutely amazing book. Gamers and fluff buffs will be happy alike with the options and versatility available to the Codex. I couldn't have asked for much better honestly.

It'll still be a little time before we work out what will rule the tournament scene and what you shouldn't touch with a 10-foot pole, but we'll get there.

So that's all I've got for now! Thanks for reading through all my waffling and half-finished thoughts.

I know I promised lists, but I'm not even finished yet. It's nearly there though and should be up in the next couple of days. It's a difficult thing to work through though with so many options.

Rhinos are exactly the same, in case you were wondering.

I can't really cover everything properly in the post, so if you have any more specific questions on units, rules or whatever, feel free to ask!

Chaos Space Marines New Codex - First Impressions

I've had a little time to go through the codex so far and check out all the cool new rules and units and whatnot, and I've got to tell you: I'm extremely happy.

I won't do a proper review of the codex until I've actually had more time with the book (some time early next week), but for now I'll just give my thoughts and let you know a few of the things I've noticed.

If the rest of the 6th edition books are like this one, it will be a good edition.

First of all, the positives. Overall, the book is so far beyond that pathetic excuse for a codex that is Codex: Chaos Space Marines 4th Edition that they're not even comparable. As is typical of anything Phil Kelly touches, the book has some very nice synergy and almost all of the units are balanced if not tournament worthy. A lot of things got much cheaper, like our regular Chaos Space Marines, Lords, Sorcerers and Raptors, while some things did get a bit more expensive, but gained some new rules and things that ultimately justify the cost.

That's not to say that Chaos Space Marines will now be able to horde up, because as far as I can see, the book really is designed for you to personalise your army with fairly tremendous amounts of upgrades and options.

All of the new additions to the book are very nice. The Maulerfiend is a Walker that gets to move 12" and ignores cover, while the Warp Talons cause any enemies within 6" to count as being hit by a weapon with the Blind USR. There's also an item that allows friendly units to not scatter when deep-striking, which has some pretty obvious synergy with the Warp Talons. The unfortunate thing is that the model with the item must have caused a wound in close combat in order to activate the Key, so it does seem a little more like a gimmick than anything, because in a lot of cases your Warp Talons will be in from reserves before you get to activate it. It'd be worth trying out in friendly games though.

Now, there are a few unfortunate things, as with all codecies. First of all, Land Raiders are 10 points more expensive than last edition and gained absolutely no new special rules. Terminators got the same kind of treatment, now costing an extra point each, although Terminators are better this edition of 40k, so I'm assuming that's why they were upped in cost, but I still don't think it was warranted. Dark Apostles are lacklustre at best, which annoyed me quite severely because I was looking to do a Word Bearers army. Maybe I'll just have to run one without the Apostle. Thousand Sons got the shaft once again and Defilers are now 45 points more than before, although they are quite boss...

Despite the few downsides, overall the book is absolutely insane. I'm having a hard time writing lists of 1850 points because I simply can't fit everything I want in.

Check back in a couple of days and I'll have a more in-depth review of the book, complete with a couple of lists and my thoughts on how to deal with what looks like the most likely 6th edition meta!