New Chaos Dex

The moment has finally come, the moment that my chosen army will once again breathe life and be the scourge of the table top, finally my army will be good as grey knights, or that is what most internet pundits have been stating since the release of the codex last week.  The truth however is a lot further from that as nobody has been able to come up with the netlist to rule them all.  As for me, I am actually quite happy with this turn of events as I find the codex to be like a fine cigar, to be enjoyed rather then rushed, to be savored rather then scarfed down, etc.  I dont want an army that is auto-take, an easy win button like how Necrons and Grey Knights are at the moment, but an army that rewards the thinking player, an army that utilizes the idea of combined arms where synergy between units is paramount.  I see this codex as that book, the thinking man's army and not one where you will see every player bringing the same list over and over.  This is a Phil Kelly production after all, where numerous builds are in, all can be competitive, and all fun to play.  For the last couple of weeks, I have read the book backwards and forwards and I still have not seen all of the combinations that are possible.  Every day I discover something new, something unique, something that I would not have thought of after going through the book the time before and this is exciting to me.  My imagination is going crazy on all of the possible builds I can do with my armies, all of the options I can take and with allies the sky is the limit.  What I thought I would do now is to discuss some of my winners of the dex as well as my thoughts on why.

Winner - Chaos Lords
 These guys saw a major improvement from the last dex.  The options that these guys have now are limitless, allowing you to build a lord that you can truely call your own.  You want a beatstick, give him the mark of Khrone, mount him on a juggernaut and give him the ax of blindness.  You want a more shooty lord, mount him on a bike and give him the brand and you have a fast moving mini hellhound that can really put out the hurt on horde and MEQ units.  All and all a winner


Winner - Chaos Space Marines
This unit is both a winner and a loser.  Let me explain, the unit definitely got a huge boost for the number of options available to them.  The fact that Marks could be taken without the icon means that marks cant be just shot off.  Gift of mutation on the champion is a nice little boost that can be good if you roll well, a homage to the old 3.5 dex of allowing you to tool up your champions.  Big squads is still in there and the base cost of each model is the lowest MEQ you could get.  Now the bad, if you tool these guys back to last edition stats, you are paying the same amount in points as the last book.  You start adding in the new stuff like marks, VOTLW, etc, and the cost starts going up.  I would be good with the price but the fact that these guys are not fearless or have some sort of ability to not be run down really takes the cake.  I would easily pay for fearless as a mark, all you are left with is an icon that can get sniped out easily especially in this edition at the cost of 25 points!!  Still not bad if taken cheap or if babysat by a fearless character.


Winner - Chaos Bikers
A unit that for the most part is a winner due to the fact of their new points cost.  They now cost the same amount Raptors cost in the last book which means big squads are a viable choice now.  6th edition has also made bikes a heck of lot better with jink saves, hammer of wrath, etc.  A good sized squad with a couple of melta guns and a mark will run you under 300 points.


Winner - Heldrake
To be honest, i didnt believe the hype when they first announced this unit.  Still didnt believe it when reading the heldrakes rules when I had the codex in hand.  After trying it for a couple of games thanks to a friend of mine letting me borrow his all I can say is awesome.  The heldrake is really good at one thing, killing infantry.  Yes this unit was billed at being the ultimate anti flyer unit however with its baleflamer is the scourge of infantry everywhere.  Its also remarkablely tough with its 5 + invul and armor 12.  It will not die just adds to its toughness which I saw first hand when I made several rolls to restore hullpoints.  Of all of the daemon engines, this one is definitely the best of the lot.  

I am still digesting the codex at this point, these were the stand outs that I saw and that I actually tried out.  I will go over the losers of the codex in my next post along with the lists that I plan on running.  All in all a great codex but one that is also filled with many missed opportunities.   

First 6th ed Tournament

 Hey guys, sorry that I havent posted in a while, life and work as really been taking its toll on me. I'm still painting figs and in fact got into warmachine a little more over the course of the last 2 months and actually painted up my first battlegroup. Pics I will save for another post as this is all about my experiences at my first 6th edition 40K tournament. I was eager to try my hand at a tourney, starting out at a lower point costed one to test my knowledge of the game but to my surprise, my first experience was at 2000 pts. In addition to the 2000pts, the tournament also required that your army take an ally. So in deciding to do this tournament, I opted to do a last hoorah for the chaos codex. I wanted to go with an army that was completely painted even though it wasnt necessary. My Thousand Sons army is fully painted however I wanted to go with an army that was entirely out of the box and one I never used before. Once I heard that they were giving out an award for best painted, I decided to go with a fluffy Khrone based army based around large squads of marines with a couple of havoc squads for support. For my allies in keeping with the Khrone theme, I decided to take a hard hitting Herald of Khorne on a juggernaut with a bloodcrusher retinue and some bloodletters to make the allies legal. Not just any Herald but the almighty Skulltaker which I had finished converting for an escalation league I had a couple of months ago. The army came in at 1990 so i took melta bombs for the 2 lords to get me to 2000 pts. Below is the list in detail. As you can see, the army contains no vehicles. I usually take at least 2 rhinos in all of my lists, in 6th however i have found that rhinos give up easy first blood points and so i decided to go with none.

HQ: Chaos Lord  = (base cost 90 + Juggernaut of Khorne 30 + Melta Bombs 5 + Mark of Khorne 10 + Daemon Weapon 40)

HQ: Chaos Lord = (base cost 90 + Juggernaut of Khorne 30 + Melta Bombs 5 + Mark of Khorne 10 + Daemon Weapon 40)

Troops: Khorne Berzerkers 9 Khorne Berzerkers = 9 * 21 (base cost 21) + Plasma Pistol x2 30 1 Skull Champion , 51 pts = (base cost 36 + Power Axe 15)

Troops: Chaos Space Marines  = 11 * 15 (base cost 15) + Icon of Khorne 30 + Meltagun x1 10 + Plasma gun x1 15 1 Aspiring Champion , 45 pts = (base cost 30 + Power Sword 15)

Troops: Chaos Space Marines  = 11 * 15 (base cost 15) + Icon of Khorne 30 + Meltagun x1 10 + Plasma gun x1 15 1 Aspiring Champion , 45 pts = (base cost 30 + Power Axe 15)

Heavy Support: Chaos Havocs  = 5 * 15 (base cost 15) + Missile Launcher x3 60

Heavy Support: Chaos Havocs  = 5 * 15 (base cost 15) + Lascannon x3 105

HQ: Skulltaker  140 + DS: Juggernaut of Khorne 35

Elite: Bloodcrushers of Khorne  = 5 * 40

Troops: Bloodletters of Khorne = 10 * 16

The army would definitely suffer in open ground which is what I expected which is why i took large squads of troops to mitigate this a little.  I knew that I would facing my share of Guard and indeed there were a lot of Guard players.  Necrons were also heavily represented including several with multiple fliers.  To say that the my list did well is an understatement, I actually went undefeated in my 3 games, tying the first game and winning my last 2 games. Unfortunately with it being a battle points tournament, I ended up in the middle of the pack as I didn't blow out my opponents. The overall winner tabled 2 of his opponents with a Necron Flyer list so there was no way I could place. I did accomplish my goal however by winning best painted, surprised as there were several different armies that we painted very well but hell, I will take it... lol. Pics are of the army itself, I went with a dark grey with dark blue details similar to the pre-heresy world eaters colors. I hate painting white so that was definitely out of the question so I went with a light grey shaded with a black wash. Let me know what you guys think.

New 40K Starter set Chaos leaked pics..

Thank you Faeit2012 and the posters on Warseer, etc who got us these pics. All I gotta say is OMG!!!! That Hellbrute is just amazing and the Chosen Chaos Marines look great as well. Someone on Faeit's blog mentioned that the chosen look like something out of the space marine video game and they are definitely right on that one. The Cultists look amazing as well. The Chaos lord looks ok, he just seems kind of static in the pose that they gave him, I will definitely with hold judgement on it until I see a better pic. Thank you GW for yet again taking my money. This along with the new Chaos dex and Forgeworld doing the hersey means I will be broke and my wife will be pissed... lol

6th edition and Tau.

Whats up everybody? I played several more games in the last couple of weeks to get more of a feel of this edition. I have to say, so far i am loving it, the changes for the most part are all good. In my latest game I used my Tau in a 1500 point game against a Grey Knight Draigo wing. We decided to play an objective game as it would have been an auto win for him if we did kill points. We rolled 3 objectives and decided against the mysterious objectives or terrain just to keep the game going. I rolled inspiring leadership for my warlord trait and my opponent got the scoring warlord trait which meant that Dragio himself was now scoring. Firewarriors not to mention crisis suits have greatly benefited from 6th edition as I could now keep on the move and out range my opponents army. Dragio wing in 6th edition is still devastating especially with the divination school but I must admit what really makes it extremely annoying is the fact that all paladins are considered characters. Unless your packing strength 8 or higher and in abundance, big paladin squads with an Apothocary are just gross when it comes to absorbing small arms fire. For 3 straight turns I shot my entire 1500 pts of Tau into my opponents 10 man squad and I was lucky to get a wound through. Look out sirs, combined with a 2 up save, combined with Feel no pain means a lot of rolls before a wound gets put on a model. My friend rolled unbelievable amounts of 5 up feel no pain which pretty much negatived all of my AP2 plasma shots. With only 3 rail guns (3 separate squads), he would put the one wound I caused on Draigo who due to him being eternal warrior, still gets his feel no pain. The Tau are definitely more mobile now, finally playing more like their fluff and against slower opponents can run circles around them. They aren't Eldar but a heck of lot faster then they were in both 4th and 5th. Wound allocations on squads made up of characters is one of the only downsides I see with 6th so far. The fact that you cant maneuver your squads to avoid the tank as your opponent could call a look out sir from any character means you will be spending most of your game just trying to kill the unit off.

I will continue to use the Tau and will be adding more broadsides and ditching the hammerhead just to get more railguns on the field. Im tempted to try out stealthsuits as well as they have become the eldar pathfinders of the Tau army. With a little terrain and the new changes to Stealth field generators, these guys will be hard to dislodge, I just wish the range of the burst cannons was longer...