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Annointed
Mar 2, 2013

Can we have the demon rhinos back please?

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Athas
Aug 6, 2007

fuck that joker
In the old days, the difference between Space Marine chapters was mostly the colours and whether you chose to fill up on bikes or jump packs or whatever. I'm not saying we should go back to that, but you can do a lot to distinguish a faction simply by which units you bring and how you play them. Maybe not all the Space Marine variants need to have a full roster of unique units. Sometimes they can just have terminators painted green, and with a particular preference for giving them close combat weapons.

No Luck Needed
Mar 18, 2015

Ravel Crew
I thought that from a lore perspective that CSM got new bikes, rhinos, and land raiders from corrupting regular SM. The longer a CSM is in the thrall of chaos, the more warped they get. Those Khorn guys start on pikes and after a good crusader or millennia they get warped into ridding wear war hound machine demons. Like how CSM don’t have dreadnaughts anymore, they have weird chaos mutations things now. I have a metal CSM dreadnaught I could dig out and take a bad picture of it. Looks just like a metal SM dreadnaught with just lots of skulls and spikey bits.

Like there isn’t a Chaos trade network of Chaos worlds. A world goes over to Chaos, gets warped, and creates demons.

Mercurius
May 4, 2004

Amp it up.

No Luck Needed posted:

Like there isn’t a Chaos trade network of Chaos worlds.
There absolutely is as many of the Dark Mechanicum’s Hellforges produce and maintain stuff that they sell or trade to the warbands.

On the Daemon side of things you’ve also got stuff like Vashtorr’s Soul Forges where he writes up literal contracts with daemons to turn them into daemon engines.

AndyElusive
Jan 7, 2007

Cease to Hope posted:

please give WE more dudes who are half chainsaw, a khorne coven who cleans the skulls, a shooting unit that flenses and flays, penitents who fight harder on death than they do normally

anything but "CSM guy with chainaxes", please

This is how you get a Chainsaw Man inspired Khornate Champion.

But there's probably a 3D printable one out there already. So missed opportunity I guess.

Cooked Auto
Aug 4, 2007

No Luck Needed posted:

Like there isn’t a Chaos trade network of Chaos worlds. A world goes over to Chaos, gets warped, and creates demons.

Nah, there is some of that as well. Considering there are corrupted Forge Worlds where the Dark Mechanicus builds a lot of stuff for various Legions. And then most likely just sells it to the highest bidder.
Like, there's obviously traitor marines who get their stuff from spoils and corrupting imperial machines, but there's definitely a case for them getting specifically built warmachines like the Defiler or Venomcrawler.

Eej
Jun 17, 2007

HEAVYARMS

Athas posted:

In the old days, the difference between Space Marine chapters was mostly the colours and whether you chose to fill up on bikes or jump packs or whatever. I'm not saying we should go back to that, but you can do a lot to distinguish a faction simply by which units you bring and how you play them. Maybe not all the Space Marine variants need to have a full roster of unique units. Sometimes they can just have terminators painted green, and with a particular preference for giving them close combat weapons.

Well it's like that nowadays too.

AndyElusive posted:

This is how you get a Chainsaw Man inspired Khornate Champion.

But there's probably a 3D printable one out there already. So missed opportunity I guess.




Eightbound rule!!

Geisladisk
Sep 15, 2007

Cease to Hope posted:

dear james workshop

there are too many armies nowadays. please eliminate three. i am not a crackpot.

this but unironically

Cease to Hope posted:

not even shitposting. less "what if an old CSM unit, but khorne" and more "what new stuff can we do with the WE aesthetic?"

please give WE more dudes who are half chainsaw, a khorne coven who cleans the skulls, a shooting unit that flenses and flays, penitents who fight harder on death than they do normally

anything but "CSM guy with chainaxes", please

Yeah. Exalted Eightbound are kinda neat in that they were clearly trying to do something new but it fell flat. Ain't no point in spinning the monogod CSM into their own big boy faction only to give them like three unique units and the rest is just CSM units.

No Luck Needed posted:

I thought that from a lore perspective that CSM got new bikes, rhinos, and land raiders from corrupting regular SM. The longer a CSM is in the thrall of chaos, the more warped they get. Those Khorn guys start on pikes and after a good crusader or millennia they get warped into ridding wear war hound machine demons. Like how CSM don’t have dreadnaughts anymore, they have weird chaos mutations things now. I have a metal CSM dreadnaught I could dig out and take a bad picture of it. Looks just like a metal SM dreadnaught with just lots of skulls and spikey bits.

Like there isn’t a Chaos trade network of Chaos worlds. A world goes over to Chaos, gets warped, and creates demons.

There literally is a Chaos trade network of Chaos worlds though. There are tons of worlds that show up in lore and novels that are dominated by some form of Chaos worshippers who still have things like "a economy" and "factories". And these produce materiel for the various Chaos armies, CSM included.

Geisladisk fucked around with this message at 23:53 on Dec 19, 2023

AndyElusive
Jan 7, 2007

Eej posted:




Eightbound rule!!

Those are badass \m/ \m/

Robert Facepalmer
Jan 10, 2019


No Luck Needed posted:

Like there isn’t a Chaos trade network of Chaos worlds. A world goes over to Chaos, gets warped, and creates demons.

Oh man, wait until you find out about the Blood Pact and Sons of Sek!

Eej
Jun 17, 2007

HEAVYARMS
The Dark Mechanicum is basically the middleman between the various mortal Chaos factions in terms of trade and economy yeah. All the more reason that I hope they are the new army introduced this edition!

Professor Shark
May 22, 2012

Would some shlub working on a Chaos world at the backpack factory even find a difference between the Imperium and the angry Chaos government ?

Eej
Jun 17, 2007

HEAVYARMS
Working conditions would be about the same but your foreman would probably have an extra eyeball growing out the back of his head

Lord Ludikrous
Jun 7, 2008

Enjoy your tea...

Lighting isn’t great but good lighting at this time of year where I am is hard to come by. Finished my Screamer Killer, and this will be my last model of 2023.






There’s a couple of elements I feel could have turned out better but overall I’m very happy with the result, and it’s a great model.

Lostconfused
Oct 1, 2008

Professor Shark posted:

Would some shlub working on a Chaos world at the backpack factory even find a difference between the Imperium and the angry Chaos government ?
Depends on the author writing the novel at the time.

JBP
Feb 16, 2017

You've got to know, to understand,
Baby, take me by my hand,
I'll lead you to the promised land.
I would hazard that the weeping sores and blood sacrifice would make chaos working conditions somewhat worse than imperial working conditions unless you come from the weeping sores and blood sacrifice imperial world.

Froghammer
Sep 8, 2012

Khajit has wares
if you have coin

Cease to Hope posted:

WE don't need bikes, they need jakhals riding flesh hounds
WE need bikes super badly

CottonWolf
Jul 20, 2012

Good ideas generator

JBP posted:

I would hazard that the weeping sores and blood sacrifice would make chaos working conditions somewhat worse than imperial working conditions unless you come from the weeping sores and blood sacrifice imperial world.

Unless you’re a Nurgle cultist, in which case, that’s chill.

JBP
Feb 16, 2017

You've got to know, to understand,
Baby, take me by my hand,
I'll lead you to the promised land.

CottonWolf posted:

Unless you’re a Nurgle cultist, in which case, that’s chill.

My understanding is that it isn't chill and nurgle cultists are all making sacrifices by getting sick. Nurgle would be the worst of all deities to fall in with because it's Clark Griswold buying that wagon, but a religion.

Innocuous
Mar 1, 2003

It's a strange world.



Okay so I've finally embraced my desire to get into 40k with a gimmick Deathwatch army that includes Imperial Agents. I'm just as quickly realizing this was a loving stupid entry point since a lot of the finer points of kill team composition are lost on me and I assume I'm kneecapping myself with the IA bullshit. Nonetheless, I've enjoyed building and painting and the DW aesthetics, and I've thrown enough money at this that I appear to have picked a hill for my kill teams to die on. I assume some of these models are just going to look rad on a shelf.

With that out of the way, I'm now looking to cobble together an army list. I realize I have more characters than I need for an army, but I'd like to maintain some flexibility to play around with different strategies and see what works for me. I'm open to adding additional units that I'm missing that could help round this out or mitigate the gimmickry. Here's what I've got so far:

Characters:
Watch Captain
Watch Master
Apothecary Biologis
Lieutenant with Combi Weapon
Chaplain in Terminator Armor
Captain in Gravis Armor
Vindicare Assassin
Inquisitor Eisenhorn
Inquisitor Greyfax
Primaris Lieutenant (combat patrol)
Primaris Apothecary (combat patrol)
Captain in Terminator Armor (starter set, needs DW conversion)

Vehicles:
Corvus Blackstar
Redemptor Dreadnaught

Infantry:
Primaris Hellblasters (10)
Primaris Infiltrators (10)
Deathwatch Veterans (10)
Heavy Intercessors (5)
Primaris Eliminators (3)
Terminator Squad (5) (+5 from starter set requiring conversion to DW)
Primaris Intercessors (10) (combat patrol)
Primaris Aggressors (3) (combat patrol)
Infernus Marines (5) (starter set)
Kill Team: Exaction Squad (operating as Subduction Squad so they can serve as retinue for an Inquisitor, if I understand the keywords system correctly)
Kill Team Cassius (can this be broken down into individuals and used in other kill teams? hearing bad things about how this plays)

Any suggestions for prioritizing which of these to finish building, and which weapon choices to build with? Should I be adding additional and/or different infantry units? More vehicles? How should I bring this mess together onto the tabletop as an actual army list?

Testikles
Feb 22, 2009

Cease to Hope posted:

dear james workshop

there are too many armies nowadays. please eliminate three. i am not a crackpot.

But actually:

Captain Magic
Apr 4, 2005

Yes, we have feathers--but the muscles of men.

Innocuous posted:

Okay so I've finally embraced my desire to get into 40k with a gimmick Deathwatch army that includes Imperial Agents. I'm just as quickly realizing this was a loving stupid entry point since a lot of the finer points of kill team composition are lost on me and I assume I'm kneecapping myself with the IA bullshit. Nonetheless, I've enjoyed building and painting and the DW aesthetics, and I've thrown enough money at this that I appear to have picked a hill for my kill teams to die on. I assume some of these models are just going to look rad on a shelf.

With that out of the way, I'm now looking to cobble together an army list. I realize I have more characters than I need for an army, but I'd like to maintain some flexibility to play around with different strategies and see what works for me. I'm open to adding additional units that I'm missing that could help round this out or mitigate the gimmickry. Here's what I've got so far:

Characters:
Watch Captain
Watch Master
Apothecary Biologis
Lieutenant with Combi Weapon
Chaplain in Terminator Armor
Captain in Gravis Armor
Vindicare Assassin
Inquisitor Eisenhorn
Inquisitor Greyfax
Primaris Lieutenant (combat patrol)
Primaris Apothecary (combat patrol)
Captain in Terminator Armor (starter set, needs DW conversion)

Vehicles:
Corvus Blackstar
Redemptor Dreadnaught

Infantry:
Primaris Hellblasters (10)
Primaris Infiltrators (10)
Deathwatch Veterans (10)
Heavy Intercessors (5)
Primaris Eliminators (3)
Terminator Squad (5) (+5 from starter set requiring conversion to DW)
Primaris Intercessors (10) (combat patrol)
Primaris Aggressors (3) (combat patrol)
Infernus Marines (5) (starter set)
Kill Team: Exaction Squad (operating as Subduction Squad so they can serve as retinue for an Inquisitor, if I understand the keywords system correctly)
Kill Team Cassius (can this be broken down into individuals and used in other kill teams? hearing bad things about how this plays)

Any suggestions for prioritizing which of these to finish building, and which weapon choices to build with? Should I be adding additional and/or different infantry units? More vehicles? How should I bring this mess together onto the tabletop as an actual army list?

So with what you have, here's what I would run as a Black Spear Task Force:

Goon list (2000 Points)

Space Marines
Deathwatch
Black Spear Task Force
Strike Force (2000 Points)

CHARACTERS

Apothecary (80 Points)
• 1x Absolvor bolt pistol
1x Close combat weapon
1x Reductor pistol
• Enhancements: Beacon Angelis

Lieutenant (80 Points)
• 1x Bolt Pistol
1x Close combat weapon
1x Master-crafted bolter
• Enhancements: Thief of Secrets

Lieutenant with Combi-weapon (70 Points)
• 1x Combi-weapon
1x Paired combat blades

Watch Master (155 Points)
• Warlord
• 1x Vigil spear
• Enhancements: The Tome of Ectoclades

BATTLELINE

Deathwatch Veterans (110 Points)
• 1x Watch Sergeant
• 1x Astartes shield
1x Xenophase blade
• 4x Deathwatch Veteran
• 2x Close combat weapon
2x Deathwatch thunder hammer
2x Frag cannon

OTHER DATASHEETS

Corvus Blackstar (180 Points)
• 1x Armoured hull
2x Blackstar rocket launcher
1x Twin assault cannon

Eliminator Squad (75 Points)
• 1x Eliminator Sergeant
• 1x Bolt pistol
1x Bolt sniper rifle
1x Close combat weapon
• 2x Eliminator
• 2x Bolt pistol
2x Bolt sniper rifle
2x Close combat weapon

Hellblaster Squad (250 Points)
• 1x Hellblaster Sergeant
• 1x Bolt pistol
1x Close combat weapon
1x Plasma incinerator
• 9x Hellblaster
• 9x Bolt pistol
9x Close combat weapon
9x Plasma incinerator

Infernus Squad (85 Points)
• 1x Infernus Sergeant
• 1x Bolt pistol
1x Close combat weapon
1x Pyreblaster
• 4x Infernus Marine
• 4x Bolt pistol
4x Close combat weapon
4x Pyreblaster

Infiltrator Squad (100 Points)
• 1x Infiltrator Sergeant
• 1x Bolt pistol
1x Close combat weapon
1x Marksman bolt carbine
• 4x Infiltrator
• 4x Bolt pistol
4x Close combat weapon
4x Marksman bolt carbine

Proteus Kill Team (360 Points)
• 6x Kill Team Veteran
• 6x Close combat weapon
2x Deathwatch thunder hammer
4x Frag cannon
• 4x Kill Team Terminator
• 3x Cyclone missile launcher
3x Power fist
1x Storm Shield
3x Storm bolter
1x Terminator thunder hammer

Redemptor Dreadnought (200 Points)
• 1x Heavy flamer
1x Heavy onslaught gatling cannon
1x Redemptor fist
1x Twin fragstorm grenade launcher

ALLIED UNITS

Inquisitor Greyfax (65 Points)
• 1x Castigation
1x Condemnor stake
1x Master-crafted power sword

Subductor Squad (110 Points)
• 1x Proctor-Subductor
• 1x Arbites shotpistol
1x Shock maul
• 9x Subductor
• 9x Arbites shotpistol
9x Shock maul

Vindicare Assassin (80 Points)
• 1x Exitus pistol
1x Exitus rifle
1x Vindicare combat knife

Exported with App Version: v1.8.1 (26), Data Version: v319

This isn't the most meta list or anything, just the one that I thought matched what you said you were looking for with all the Imperial Agent stuff included.

So, the Lieutenant w/Combi-Weapon is running around just doing actions, not getting shot because he's got Lone Operative. Watch Master teams up with the Proteus KT and slides inside the Corvus, staying alive until at least he's got his Tome of Ectoclades targets picked out and shot to death. If you can, try to use him to advance and charge with your KT thunder hammers on some vulnerable unit.
Hellblasters team up with the Lieutenant (Lethal Hits) [who also will be kind of amazing in combat if you get there, thanks to Thief of Secrets] and the Apothecary (extends Hellblaster unit life a little, because some absolutely will die to hazardous).
Infernus squad is a foot-slogging screen, Inquisitor and Subductor squad are roaming around doing actions and being kind of a melee threat (they are kind of expensive and bad for what they do), infiltrators are probably sticking on your home objective blocking out deep strike, and the eliminators are kind of just thrown away on an early objective and maybe harassing the opponent with move-shoot-move shenanigans. Redemptor is just backing up your boys, send him to wherever needs beef.

If I were to change the above, I'd use a librarian instead of an apothecary (I worry more about my opponent targeting them than bringing them back one at a time), and maybe a captain instead of a lieutenant because they're better in combat. Might also drop the thief of secrets entirely, drop the infernus and add in more infiltrators. And for me personally, I wouldn't include imperial agent stuff. There's good things there (right now namely the assassins and Draxus), I just enjoy all space marine boys to keep things simpler.

Mostly all your killing power from this list would be coming from your proteus KT, your Redemptor, and your Hellblasters. That's okay, but it's missing out on Inceptors and Aggressors at the moment. There's another version of this list that drops the Corvus for Aggressors and an Apothecary Biologis, messing around with enhancements until the points work, and maybe adding in a rhino or two so you're not so slow without the corvus.

In my own lists, I've been leaning more and more heavily on two rhinos, two indomitor KTs (there is a crazy output of fire you can have), and KT Veterans w/ DW Thunder Hammers and Frag Cannons and then also Inceptors. I see a lot of lists that use Whirlwinds, Callidus Assassins (like every imperium list lately, which probably signals a nerf), and Inceptors (may also have a nerf incoming). MOST of the lists I see use Vanguard or Ironstorm detachments and honestly they are probably better, I just only have the bandwidth to know Black Spear right now.

John Romero
Jul 6, 2003

John Romero got made a bitch
at least if you work on a chaos forgeworld you might get to do some sunkin and funkin

Innocuous
Mar 1, 2003

It's a strange world.



Captain Magic posted:

This isn't the most meta list or anything, just the one that I thought matched what you said you were looking for with all the Imperial Agent stuff included.

This is all extremely good to know.

As someone poking around in character sheets but without practical experience in rules interaction, it seemed to me like Greyfax's No Escape ability might pair well with the Subductor Squad's Nuncio Aquila Aura to try and force battle shock and subtracted-roll desperate escapes. Greyfax and the Subductor squad could fit in the Corvus Blackstar and use it to close the gap on units pushing in the margin, though with the disembarkation rules I don't know if it's better to try and smokescreen the Blackstar through the enemy's turn before disembarking.

I assume there are probably better methods/units to make the play I'm envisioning, but is this even feasible?

Eej
Jun 17, 2007

HEAVYARMS
Well the main thing is what kind of situation do you expect to force a battleshock and pin a unit down on? No one's going to try to Fall Back from Subductor Squads unless you manage to pin some Tau. Anything else that can pick up a stick is going to brutally murder the entire squad on the crackback.

Nancy
Nov 23, 2005



Young Orc

John Romero posted:

at least if you work on a chaos forgeworld you might get to do some sunkin and funkin

You have a 1/4 chance of that, maybe 1/5 or 1/6 depending on how you count gods.

Much more likely you get bloodcrushed or nurglings infest your guts.

Captain Magic
Apr 4, 2005

Yes, we have feathers--but the muscles of men.

Innocuous posted:

This is all extremely good to know.

As someone poking around in character sheets but without practical experience in rules interaction, it seemed to me like Greyfax's No Escape ability might pair well with the Subductor Squad's Nuncio Aquila Aura to try and force battle shock and subtracted-roll desperate escapes. Greyfax and the Subductor squad could fit in the Corvus Blackstar and use it to close the gap on units pushing in the margin, though with the disembarkation rules I don't know if it's better to try and smokescreen the Blackstar through the enemy's turn before disembarking.

I assume there are probably better methods/units to make the play I'm envisioning, but is this even feasible?


Well the problem is

Eej posted:

Well the main thing is what kind of situation do you expect to force a battleshock and pin a unit down on? No one's going to try to Fall Back from Subductor Squads unless you manage to pin some Tau. Anything else that can pick up a stick is going to brutally murder the entire squad on the crackback.

yeah pretty much this.

So the reason to take Imperial Agents in the game as it is right now, by and large, is for cheap action doers. Callidus does this really well, Eversor does this really well, even the Callixus does it reasonably. The 165...170? point unit of an inquisitor+exaction squad is a whole lot of points in an already really elite version of an elite army (Deathwatch are a little more elite than regular space marines--by "elite" I just mean in terms of point costs). The subductors are neat in that they have a 4+ invuln, but that's on T3, 1 wound units...they're going to die pretty fast and don't have access to something like Armour of Contempt, which your marines (especially terminators and gravis marines) will.

Is that list playable? Like, absolutely. It's even good for learning the game and just having a decent time. You're not going to embarrass yourself or give anyone a bad game because of the nature of the list. But after a few games, I would bet you take the Subductors out and add in like...I don't know, Aggressors and some Inquisitorial agents, just because it will be more fun to shoot and roll dice and actually do damage, lol.

The reason I say to put the Proteus in the Corvus is because it's a LOT of wounds in one unit, which otherwise wouldn't be able to fit inside a transport except for the Corvus's special rule regarding Kill Teams. The frag cannons and thunder hammers are very good weapons the Deathwatch has access to, and both require short range. With the Watch Master inside, you have advance and charge on a pretty deadly unit, and you can pick their engagement more easily given the high mobility of the Corvus.

The way you are thinking about combining Greyfax's ability and the subductor's ability is perfectly correct, except that it rests a false premise: that being, battleshock is a useful tactic to build around. I'd try to think of battleshock more like a "nice to have" instead of a build-around right now.

Innocuous
Mar 1, 2003

It's a strange world.



Captain Magic posted:

Well the problem is

yeah pretty much this.

So the reason to take Imperial Agents in the game as it is right now, by and large, is for cheap action doers. Callidus does this really well, Eversor does this really well, even the Callixus does it reasonably. The 165...170? point unit of an inquisitor+exaction squad is a whole lot of points in an already really elite version of an elite army (Deathwatch are a little more elite than regular space marines--by "elite" I just mean in terms of point costs). The subductors are neat in that they have a 4+ invuln, but that's on T3, 1 wound units...they're going to die pretty fast and don't have access to something like Armour of Contempt, which your marines (especially terminators and gravis marines) will.

Is that list playable? Like, absolutely. It's even good for learning the game and just having a decent time. You're not going to embarrass yourself or give anyone a bad game because of the nature of the list. But after a few games, I would bet you take the Subductors out and add in like...I don't know, Aggressors and some Inquisitorial agents, just because it will be more fun to shoot and roll dice and actually do damage, lol.

The reason I say to put the Proteus in the Corvus is because it's a LOT of wounds in one unit, which otherwise wouldn't be able to fit inside a transport except for the Corvus's special rule regarding Kill Teams. The frag cannons and thunder hammers are very good weapons the Deathwatch has access to, and both require short range. With the Watch Master inside, you have advance and charge on a pretty deadly unit, and you can pick their engagement more easily given the high mobility of the Corvus.

The way you are thinking about combining Greyfax's ability and the subductor's ability is perfectly correct, except that it rests a false premise: that being, battleshock is a useful tactic to build around. I'd try to think of battleshock more like a "nice to have" instead of a build-around right now.

Really good explanation, thanks. Any particular resources you'd recommend in terms of learning how to think about 40k tactics?

Eej
Jun 17, 2007

HEAVYARMS

Nancy posted:

You have a 1/4 chance of that, maybe 1/5 or 1/6 depending on how you count gods.

Much more likely you get bloodcrushed or nurglings infest your guts.

I was about to say well at least Nurglings are cute and silly but then I remember those cute little comics of the chibi Chaos Gods living together having silly fun and then one of them swerves when Nurgle steps aside for a moment and the art style shifts to show a chained and broken Isha in a dark room being given soup by Nurgle and that kind of recontextualized how creepy Nurgle is.


Captain Magic posted:

Well the problem is

yeah pretty much this.

So the reason to take Imperial Agents in the game as it is right now, by and large, is for cheap action doers. Callidus does this really well, Eversor does this really well, even the Callixus does it reasonably. The 165...170? point unit of an inquisitor+exaction squad is a whole lot of points in an already really elite version of an elite army (Deathwatch are a little more elite than regular space marines--by "elite" I just mean in terms of point costs). The subductors are neat in that they have a 4+ invuln, but that's on T3, 1 wound units...they're going to die pretty fast and don't have access to something like Armour of Contempt, which your marines (especially terminators and gravis marines) will.

Is that list playable? Like, absolutely. It's even good for learning the game and just having a decent time. You're not going to embarrass yourself or give anyone a bad game because of the nature of the list. But after a few games, I would bet you take the Subductors out and add in like...I don't know, Aggressors and some Inquisitorial agents, just because it will be more fun to shoot and roll dice and actually do damage, lol.

The reason I say to put the Proteus in the Corvus is because it's a LOT of wounds in one unit, which otherwise wouldn't be able to fit inside a transport except for the Corvus's special rule regarding Kill Teams. The frag cannons and thunder hammers are very good weapons the Deathwatch has access to, and both require short range. With the Watch Master inside, you have advance and charge on a pretty deadly unit, and you can pick their engagement more easily given the high mobility of the Corvus.

The way you are thinking about combining Greyfax's ability and the subductor's ability is perfectly correct, except that it rests a false premise: that being, battleshock is a useful tactic to build around. I'd try to think of battleshock more like a "nice to have" instead of a build-around right now.

If all those dudes charge into a leaderless unit of 5 Chosen (110 points) if you don't manage to kill any of them you have to eat 21 attacks at WS3, S5, AP-2 for 1 damage each. You are quite likely literally going to wipe your own squad (probably not Greyfax cause she's a badass) by charging into them. Chosen are monsters at melee, of course, but that's kind of what a "real" melee unit looks like at that point cost.

Lostconfused
Oct 1, 2008

You can also have a complete psychotic breakdown thanks to warp corruption and not worry about things anymore without having to go through the whole process of being turned into a servitor. I guess that's another upside for worshiping chaos.

S.J.
May 19, 2008

Just who the hell do you think we are?

Professor Shark posted:

Would some shlub working on a Chaos world at the backpack factory even find a difference between the Imperium and the angry Chaos government ?

Probably not, and this is an important point of contention that gets brought up quite often

Captain Magic
Apr 4, 2005

Yes, we have feathers--but the muscles of men.

Eej posted:

If all those dudes charge into a leaderless unit of 5 Chosen (110 points) if you don't manage to kill any of them you have to eat 21 attacks at WS3, S5, AP-2 for 1 damage each. You are quite likely literally going to wipe your own squad (probably not Greyfax cause she's a badass) by charging into them. Chosen are monsters at melee, of course, but that's kind of what a "real" melee unit looks like at that point cost.

lol god chosen at 110 makes the subductors seem so much worse, yeah.

Innocuous posted:

Really good explanation, thanks. Any particular resources you'd recommend in terms of learning how to think about 40k tactics?

I think Tactical Tortoise or Art of War 40k on youtube are both pretty good at explaining their reasoning; they do a good job of having positions but also really explaining why something works and often when it doesn't. It's a lot of information, but if you like a good info dump, they're both good for it. Art of War does good weekly Tier Lists, Fix My List, and List Building videos where they talk a lot about why this or that unit is and is not included. I've found myself listening even sometimes to armies that have nothing to do with mine just because I like to hear their reasoning. These are *really* competitively focused, which they try to flag frequently, so like don't feel compelled to match what they say or buy what they build because they're talking about play on a very high (and very expensive) level. It's just cool, imo, to hear their reasoning and go, "Well, I'm not buying [whatever], but I can still have a lot of similar damage if I do X."

There is a lot of 40k army building that is just finding out what you think is fun. Like--if I played John Lennon's Vanguard Space Marines that went 2nd at the world championships, I'd probably win some games, but I'd hate playing it because it's so focused on the minutia of very tiny movements. I would easily and happily play the CSM list that got first, however, because that's a lot of just punching in the face. It takes just some playtime to figure out where you want to play on the spectrums of elite vs. horde, shooty vs. melee, and tricky vs. straightforward; then once you figure that out, it's easier to read a codex/index to find out what you want to put together to match how you like to play.

Cease to Hope
Dec 12, 2011

Captain Magic posted:

There is a lot of 40k army building that is just finding out what you think is fun. Like--if I played John Lennon's Vanguard Space Marines that went 2nd at the world championships, I'd probably win some games, but I'd hate playing it because it's so focused on the minutia of very tiny movements.

that list has infiltrating aggressors with double characters, deep striking cent devs, and 15 inceptors. if you want to play like lennon does, you will want to squeeze out every half inch, but the list itself is also a sack of basically unscreenable hammers. i recommend anyone with the models play it, because it is a hoot.

Athas
Aug 6, 2007

fuck that joker
It seems that ruins are important to balanced games (because they block LoS), but I don't really like the aesthetics of always fighting in urban areas. I'd much rather use trees - and also I have more of those. Can anyone think of a problem with treating densely wooded areas as if they were ruins?

Geisladisk
Sep 15, 2007

JBP posted:

My understanding is that it isn't chill and nurgle cultists are all making sacrifices by getting sick. Nurgle would be the worst of all deities to fall in with because it's Clark Griswold buying that wagon, but a religion.

Falling to Nurgle would probably be pretty okay, relatively speaking. People generally fall to Nurgle because they get extremely sick or afraid of sickness, either from one of Nurgle's supernatural plagues or a mundane one. Nurgle worship offers them relief; They're still sick, but they no longer suffer from it. They're just giddy and delirious. Nurgle worshippers are generally depicted as quite cheery.

Which isn't great, but beats the other options.

Khorne: You are a angry murderman. You must murder, and are always angry. It's like a burning itch in your brain. Murdering only provides temporary relief.
Tzeentch: You are a neurotic, compulsively scheming little guy. Your schemes all fail, or your boss takes credit for all of them. You end up as a chaos spawn sooner or later.
Slaanessh: Initially all the drugs and loving you do is awesome, but your senses eventually become dulled by it, and you need to do ever more hosed up poo poo to feel even the slightest pleasure. Eventually you are a anhedonic monster doing the most hosed up things imaginable to yourself and others, desperately trying to feel anything.

Nancy
Nov 23, 2005



Young Orc

Geisladisk posted:

Falling to Nurgle would probably be pretty okay, relatively speaking. People generally fall to Nurgle because they get extremely sick or afraid of sickness, either from one of Nurgle's supernatural plagues or a mundane one. Nurgle worship offers them relief; They're still sick, but they no longer suffer from it. They're just giddy and delirious. Nurgle worshippers are generally depicted as quite cheery.

Which isn't great, but beats the other options.

Khorne: You are a angry murderman. You must murder, and are always angry. It's like a burning itch in your brain. Murdering only provides temporary relief.
Tzeentch: You are a neurotic, compulsively scheming little guy. Your schemes all fail, or your boss takes credit for all of them. You end up as a chaos spawn sooner or later.
Slaanessh: Initially all the drugs and loving you do is awesome, but your senses eventually become dulled by it, and you need to do ever more hosed up poo poo to feel even the slightest pleasure. Eventually you are a anhedonic monster doing the most hosed up things imaginable to yourself and others, desperately trying to feel anything.

I think The Lords of Silence had an interesting picture of what Nurgle can look like. It has a cool juxtaposition of relatively chill plague marine POV chapters were everyone is very laid back and petting nurglings interspersed with horrific human POV chapters.

The other "Chaos Society" books I can think of are the Word Bearers series, which definitely has a "living envy the dead" vibe, and the Night Lords series, which has a an awful voidship underbelly society but probably not that different from it's Imperial counterparts.

poop chute
Nov 16, 2023

by Athanatos

Eej posted:

The Dark Mechanicum is basically the middleman between the various mortal Chaos factions in terms of trade and economy yeah. All the more reason that I hope they are the new army introduced this edition!

How do you differentiate Badmech from Admech, mechanically? Or visually, even?

Gravitas Shortfall
Jul 17, 2007

Utility is seven-eighths Proximity.


poop chute posted:

How do you differentiate Badmech from Admech, mechanically? Or visually, even?

Badmech are willing and able to bind demons into war machines. They also are keen on experimentation and tend to have utilise non-STC designs based on whatever crazy idea the local forgemaster likes.

Ruleswise, idk.

JBP
Feb 16, 2017

You've got to know, to understand,
Baby, take me by my hand,
I'll lead you to the promised land.

Gravitas Shortfall posted:

Badmech are willing and able to bind demons into war machines. They also are keen on experimentation and tend to have utilise non-STC designs based on whatever crazy idea the local forgemaster likes.

Ruleswise, idk.

Army wide hazardous guns.

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rantmo
Jul 30, 2003

A smile better suits a hero



poop chute posted:

Or visually, even?

Tabletop Tactics has a cool Dark Mechanicum army that someone converted for them, it goes in a very different direction than a GW version would, of course, but it's distinctive and shows a way to make them their own thing, aesthetically.

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