This next week a prep league for a GT in my area (and
adepticon too) will start up, and after not being able to answer Grey Knights
and select Imperial Guard build with my Tyranids I have spent the last few
weeks seeing if building up (and converting) a Chaos Space Marine army would be
a viable choice for Adepticon. This decision was not fully about simply being
competitive and winning, as there are a lot of things that this book gives me
to try and convert on top of allowing me to paint in a grimy gory style I have
wanted to try, but being at least as good with Nidzilla seems a reasonable
standard. I now believe I have found a list that meets both of these
requirements.
The List
Typhus
33 Cultists
10 Cultists
10 Cultists
10 Cultists
Heldrake (Baleflamer)
Heldrake (Baleflamer)
6 Havocs (4 Lascannon)
6 Havocs (4 Lascannon)
6 Havocs (4 Lascannon)
Masque
9 Flamers of Tzeentch
5 Plaguebearers of Nurgle
Aegis Defense Line (Quad Gun)
The only small change
after two games was dropping three cultists for an extra guy in the last havoc
squad. It is a pretty simple list. Mass lascannons give me a big presence in
terms of ranged firepower and by turn two most games I have three units with
flame templates that ignore the armor of most everything, plus a Herald that allows
me to move my opponents units into the right position to be hit by said
templates. It also has five scoring units that all have FNP and are fearless.
More after the jump...
The Hobby Side
I really like conversions,
and did some cool kitbash work to create my Tervigons out of arachnarok spider
parts. All of my Dark Eldar wracks were made out of various fantasy bits from
empire, to skaven, and even elves. This though will be the first time I have
converted a full army. Literally every model will be converted in some way.
For example, my heldrakes,
which hopefully will be visually the center of the army, are going to be
converted from a storm talon and a vendetta. The vendetta will have a daemon
literally flying out the front of it, while the storm talon will have the daemon
more integrated. I want to use the flame part from the skaven plague furnace to
create the effect that the daemon is literally throwing balls of fire for the
baleflamer.
The havocs are going to
have custom made lascannons, I already have the catachan bits to start off on
my zombies, and some models such as The Masque and Typhus will be original
kitbashed creations.
I really am excited to try
new things painting too. I have not painted any armies covered in gore. This
army is going to be dirty, bloody, and rotten. Mixed in though is going to be
the bright colors of tzeentch and other effects I want to try. I also want to
do some crazy green stuff work too. I am pumped to work on this (and thus not
at all motivated to get my dark elves painted).
The Gaming Side
I tested this list against
two opponents. The first had a decked out Draigowing with Coteaz, three min
henchmen units in psybacks, 2 incinerator dreadknights, a storm raven, and an
aegis with a quad. It was dawn of war and the missions were kill points primary
with the relic secondary. He deployed across the center with his aegis forward
of the front of his deployment. I put a havoc squad in area terrain on each
flank, Typhus and 35 cultists in a ruin in the center, and the five man havoc squad
on an upper floor of that ruin. I failed to seize.
He scouts the paladins
with his grandmaster power. Coteaz took divination and got the powers to twin
link weapons and ignore cover. He uses this to kill my center havoc squad.
Paladins are a rough bunch for me to face in any setting, so I go big with my
preferred wave and get both the masque and the flamers. The flamers were placed
eight inches from the paladins, but still scattered onto them, ending up
getting placed in the farthest corner of the board. The mask was thus stuck
alone in the center of the table. She pavaned the paladins so that Draigo went
to the back, Coteaz was in the front, and most the squad did not get aegis
cover. My lascannons killed Coteaz and one paladin, but without psychic boosts
his shooting would be greatly diminished, especially with Typhus giving the
paladins the weapon virus power. I moved the cultists back so that they would
not get incinerated by the dreadknights. I don’t even try to go for the relic;
it is pointless until I kill the paladins.
Draigo picks up the relic
and moves forward. They shoot at havocs and with the psybacks help kill a
squad. A dreadknight charges the masque and they tie combat at nothing a piece
(she did rend twice though…and I forgot hit and run). The storm raven quickly
rid the table of my quad gun. On my turn I got all of my reserves except two
zombie squads. Plaguebearers drop behind his lines and the dragons flame the
paladins. I move zombies back again. Lascannons kill two paladins. The flamers
move up and are in a ruin now, nearing his stuff.
Draigo continues forward and
kills a few zombies. A 4+ cover save with FNP is nearly as good as terminator
armor, so they are pretty resilient. The storm raven kills two havocs (one
lascannon). Draigo is close enough now that I think I can get the charge on
him. I don’t have enough fire power to shoot him dead. I get the contagion
power that makes Draigo -1S and -1T, so that is a good sign too. I flame two
henchmen and some rhinos with one dragon, and the other flew off the table
(maybe vector-locked from his quad?). The plaguebearers kill the third henchman
and take over his quadgun. I miss my five inch charge with Typhus and friends.
The next turn Draigo does charge. My opponent cockily challenges and I send in
my cultist champ who died…but, because paladins are T3 and Typhus has a S6
daemon weapon he killed six paladins by himself. Boss.
At the end of the game my
opponent had Draigo (with relic), one Paladin, the storm raven, both
dreadknights, and three henchmen. I had one dragon, two small cultist squads,
three havocs (2 lascannons), 7 flamers, and a plaguebearer squad. I lost, both
my list, with practice can beat the Draigo win. In fact, if I go first I think
I have a pretty good shot. I look forward to trying this one out again.
Game two I played a friend
who I have traveled to tournaments with, but never actually played. He has been
playing Chaos Space Marines for ages and was pumped to have them get a boost
(he was still good with the old book, getting 10th at the Midwest Massacre).
He brought Abaddon, the black mace nurgle prince, two ten man plasma chosen
squads, twenty cultists, a dragon, two defilers, and a quad gun. The mission
was the scouring as primary and kill points as secondary. I went first.
 |
| Best scatter ever? I think yes! |
My havocs are all in ruins
and the zombies are all behind them (on two objectives) except Typhus and the
35, who are front and center with cover from the aegis. My opponent is huddled
behind his aegis further back. For my preferred wave I go with just the flamers
who come in. They scatter a huge amount and land right in front of Abbadon’s
unit, killing all of the chosen, putting two wounds on Abaddon, a wound on the
daemon prince, and killing two cultists. I got lucky with that one. My
lascannons are ineffective on the shrouded daemon prince.
Abaddon joins the other
cultist unit who moves forward to rapid fire the flamers. He also moves the
defiler forward so that if he needs to charge the dirge casters will prevent my
overwatch (great tactic). He kills my flamers shooting with several units. The
battle cannons scatter away from my havocs. The daemon prince charges my
cultists, and even with seven rerolls (from 35 cultists) can’t pass enough saves
to not die. The black mace effect only killed five cultists though. FNP is win.
 |
| Things are pretty desolate after turn 2. |
On my turn two the Masque
shows up and bunches the cultists and chosen, with the dragons killing all of
the chosen (lascannons finished Abaddon) and all but a few cultists. By the end
of turn four all he has left is the daemon prince (who took until turn four to
get free of the 35 cultist mob) and a defiler. I have six lascannons, the
quadgun, two dragons, plaguebearers, and two and a half small squads of
zombies. Chris is going to try his list again swapping out the defilers for
land raiders. I think this greatly improves his list.
All in all I really like
the list. I am not going to say it is the best yet or that it can handle
everything (I know for a fact daemons could be a problem), but for now I like
it and think I will run with it for a bit.
With that I am going to
end this series. Coming up there will be some hobby progress (I only have 12
days to paint my dark elves for a GT) and ideally I will actually put together
some battle reports. Until then…may the imperium burn!
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