Suggestions for a very basic, but narrative, Chaos list

[LordPathos]

Hey guys,

I like theatrical armies and battles (that's why I love Nidzilla and my Wraith army). After my move a month ago I am no longer close to, what was, my LGS and I haven't found a new one yet. Because of this, I can only play against my friend that has Necrons. And Necrons get real old, real quick. (He used to have Eldar and Orks but he brought them through an airport and they practically destroyed his box of models. Older metal pieces tipped the metal detector and they didn't handle the package with care. Sucks.)

Now for my point, as some of you know I have Grey Knights and Sisters of Battle. And while I have made a fun narrative battles with my Nids and Eldar fighting Necrons, I cannot really see myself doing the same with Necrons over and over. Necrons vs SoB would be fun for a bit, but I feel fighting with GK could get bland. So I am thinking of collecting a small narrative Chaos army to pit against my armies. Something that shows the initial invasion or corruption of a planet. By no means is it meant to be competitive, meta, or possibly tempt me to start collecting Chaos. Just something I can swap out for some fun, casual games or build a campaign out of.

So let's just go through the FoC:
HQ:
A Dark Apostle would probably be a solid HQ to go for this theme.
I don't see a Chaos Lord and/or Sorcerer being a bad secondary choice either. A decked out Chaos Lord vs a GK Grand Master would be awesome. Or a Sorcerer vs Librarian.
I think a Daemon Prince would give the GK justification to show up.

Troops: I'm thinking Cultists are going to be a must. They are perfect unit that would cause Sisters to show up in the first place. Especially paired with the Dark Apostle.
A few CSM units, 2 units of 10 max, would probably fit.

Elites:
Here, I'm not so sure. I want to stay away from the Chaos Gods' dedicated units. So no Zerkers, Noise, Plague, or Suns.
I'm thinking either 1 unit of Chosen or Possessed, if any.
A unit of Terminators would lead to some good rivalry and some cool showdowns. Probably just 1 unit with no more than 5 models. I'm thinking for what I want, the starting count of 3 as a body guard for the Lord or Sorc would be fine.
A Helbrute would probably be a fun addition and give those Dominions something to go after.

Fast Attack:
As much as I like what you can do with Bikes, Talons, Raptors, and Heldrakes, I don't feel they would fit the theme of this army. Maybe, MAYBE a small unit of bikes.
Chaos Spawn I think would fit. (Need more excuses for GKs to be there)

Heavy Support:
Let me just get this out of the way, I feel most of the stuff in this section is too much. As much as I like the Forgefiend/Maulerfiend, I feel a Helbrute is enough for what I'm going for.
I think the best choice here would be a Predator. A simple, long range vehicle.

This is just my idea of what a generic CSM list could be. And as I was typing this up I was thinking I kind of want this army to mirror my Sisters and Grey Knights, but still give each army a fluffy enemy to fight.
Grand Master vs Chaos Lord
Librarian vs Sorcerer
Cannoness vs Dark Apostle
Sisters/PAGK vs Cultists/CSM
Termies/Paladins vs Termies/any Daemon (Spawns, Possessed, etc)
Dominions vs Helbrutes
Exorcists vs Predators
Dreadknight vs Daemon Prince

If anyone could offer some comments on my initial thoughts, or have their own, please leave some feedback. I wasn't planning on Daemon allies, but if you think of a way it could fit, make the argument. And that goes for anything, even the things I was thinking of not using at all.

Aaaaaand go!

[LordPathos]

Welp, no one has left any feedback. But that's okay! I'm just gonna keep putting ideas out there!

As of right now I am thinking of running the Chaos Warband and Favoured of Chaos formations along side a CAD with the Dark Apostle and cultists.
The Warband has that perfect variety I'm looking for, Favoured of Chaos puts a lot of deamons out there so plenty for my GKs to play with, and the CAD is the perfect force for my SoB. It's that perfect blend of Witch Hunter and Daemon Hunter goodness.
In my first post I said I wasn't too keen on bringing Bikes in, so if that ever deterred me, I could definitely fit everything from the Warband I wanted into the CAD with the Apostle and a second one.

[gigasnail]

Chaos fluff is so broad, it's difficult to actually give you feedback in making a fluffy list. You can literally do whatever and it will fit some definition of fluff for one faction or another.

[blackrainbow]

Write up a brief two page on the planet and how it is falling to chaos and what the planetary governor is doing to staunch it. That should give great direction and all the background you'll need for it.

[paxmiles]

Sept 16, 2016 4:09:08 GMT LordPathos said:

So let's just go through the FoC:
HQ:
A Dark Apostle would probably be a solid HQ to go for this theme.
I don't see a Chaos Lord and/or Sorcerer being a bad secondary choice either. A decked out Chaos Lord vs a GK Grand Master would be awesome. Or a Sorcerer vs Librarian.
I think a Daemon Prince would give the GK justification to show up.

Troops: I'm thinking Cultists are going to be a must. They are perfect unit that would cause Sisters to show up in the first place. Especially paired with the Dark Apostle.
A few CSM units, 2 units of 10 max, would probably fit.

Elites:
Here, I'm not so sure. I want to stay away from the Chaos Gods' dedicated units. So no Zerkers, Noise, Plague, or Suns.
I'm thinking either 1 unit of Chosen or Possessed, if any.
A unit of Terminators would lead to some good rivalry and some cool showdowns. Probably just 1 unit with no more than 5 models. I'm thinking for what I want, the starting count of 3 as a body guard for the Lord or Sorc would be fine.
A Helbrute would probably be a fun addition and give those Dominions something to go after.

Fast Attack:
As much as I like what you can do with Bikes, Talons, Raptors, and Heldrakes, I don't feel they would fit the theme of this army. Maybe, MAYBE a small unit of bikes.
Chaos Spawn I think would fit. (Need more excuses for GKs to be there)

Heavy Support:
Let me just get this out of the way, I feel most of the stuff in this section is too much. As much as I like the Forgefiend/Maulerfiend, I feel a Helbrute is enough for what I'm going for.
I think the best choice here would be a Predator. A simple, long range vehicle.

So first, staying away from god-specific choices sounds like a fluff thing (or going mono-god), but you'll often cripple the army in doing so just because the GW rules assume you are playing a mixed god army with this codex. A common solution to this is to just model that the god specific options seem more thematic with what you are fielding. This is very much a sore spot for chaos players - haven't had a good fluffy AND viable codex since 4th.

HQ:

Dark Apostle is a Chaplain. If the theme is anti-GK or anti-Sisters, then him not being a psyker is a strong point, but also somewhat anti-thematic. I suggest a lesser sorcerer (like a level 1 sorcerer) and a daemon prince, for your theme. You could also take Thousand sons unit as your sorcerer, but theme them as a lesser sorcerer and his bodyguards. Daemon Princes MUST choose a deity allegiance, so you should have one selected that makes the most sense for your theme.

It is notable that a psyker with the daemon rule (like your prince) does not perils on any double when casting malefic damonology powers (perils on double 6s only). Crimson Slaughter, I think, has an artefact which gives the daemon rule to your normal sorcerer or lord.

Elites:

So depending on your theme, having more or less units with the daemon rule is something you want to look at. There is strong synergy between the daemon rule and the malefic daemonoloy psychic powers. Likewise, grey knights are very strong against models with the daemon rule. It is noteable that Chosen function more as scout marines due to their infiltration ability. They are a good unit in any list.

Troops:

Cultists are fun. You'll probably end up with at least one cult troop as a troops option, due to your HQ selection. Stock chaos marines are horribly limited because of their very dated special/heavy weapon ratio requirements. I personally suggest against chaos marine troop units unless you have a very specific role in mind. The typical favorite of non-aligned chaos players is noise marines, as the stock noise marine is fearless and has much more going for them than the stock chaos marine. And the noise marines don't require any sonic gear.

Fast:

Chaos spawn are pretty terrible, but they can be fun and are very fast. You will find that if you don't include a helldrake, chaos marines don't have a lot of other good AA options. And you can totally convert an imperial flyer to be a mutated flyer, instead of using the drake model.

Heavy:

Longest range unit is actually the defiler. It's basically a mutated leman russ. Predator can work too, but you'll find yourself outranged by TAU and other shooty armies. If you don't have a helldrake, you really should include havocs for AA. Recommended havoc AA build is autocannons, not missiles - Its a volume fire thing. You will get better results with the autocannons.

LoW:

Not a lot of good options until you see the Renegade Knight rules. There's an AA carapace option here, if you don't have an AA solution elsewhere.

[LordPathos]

I'm thinking I could do a quadruple threat match vs the Sisters and Grey Knights. I have 1 major hitter representing each God in mind. A Dark Apostle of Slannesh is corrupting the citizens with all things perverse. This creates the heretics (Cultists) that the Sisters would come to snuff out. However, a Chaos Lord of Nurgle and a Sorcerer of Tzeentch have heard of this open revolt and want part of the action (or maybe one of them was in on it and was waiting for the revolt to happen before they invade). Then, Khorne, not wanting to be left out of the fight of course, sends out a Daemon Prince to add to the conflict.

I don't want to flood the Chaos side with supplement buffs and special rules because Sisters don't get nice things and GK, while I think would do well against Chaos, are aching for some love too. Due to this, any of the 'followers' to the HQ choices are not going get the same Marks. I feel that just the benefits of taking a few formations will be enough to even out the Chaos side. I do wish I could get a few more Warp Charges on the Chaos side though. Even with a Sorc at ML 3, all I have to do is bring 1 Librarian and GK unit and I have the WC advantage. I have to still go through the all the relics and such for the different supplements. Or possibly swap the Daemon of Khorne to anything else and get some added ML that way.

[LordPathos]

Question about supplements, can a unit from a formation come from a supplement? Like can the Daemon Prince from the Favored of Chaos formation take Crimson Slaughter relics? I'm also assuming I cannot mix supplements in the same detachment? Like if I had a CAD with a 2 different Lords, one couldn't be Crimson Slaughter and the other could be Black Legion right?

[gigasnail]

You can make any CSM formation or detachment into a BL or CS formation/detachment, it is in their rules.

However, you are correct that you can't mix/match inside a formation.

[cypheon]

Fluffy chaos uprising? Cultists, cultists, and more cultists.

I would suggest the warp talons as being perfectly fine for the scenario you alluded to, as their own fluff suggests they stay in the warp until drawn to a killing field like vultures. Very angry, lightning wielding, vultures...

Otherwise, units like obliterators and mutilators don't have to be depicted as space marines. They could be cultists that have been "blessed" by the dark apostle in response to the sob/gk's coming to investigate. This has the added bonus of giving you a wealth of long range and melee options to provide more interesting fights.

If you must have both fast attack, and at least one marine style unit.. get both through the bikers. Nurgle bikers survive a hell of a beatdown, and fit your theme by being constantly on the move, going undetected by authorities by being able to survive the toxic wastes outside of hive cities, escorting the Dark Apostle from hive to hive, gradually building the cult...

[LordPathos]

After some more thought, I've come up with a few things. For the most part, while CSM don't get all the goodies the loyalists do, they can get some decent buffs. But I don't want to flood this army with that. Besides, even though GK get some neat things, they focus on Daemons and I don't think I'll be bringing that many in the first place. Favored of Chaos formation tops. Plus, god knows Sisters don't have the love right now.

That being said, I do want to upgrade the major pieces of my Quad Threat army. Yes, that is what I'm calling it.

I want the Chaos Lord to be a beefy, fat, buffed Nurlge beast. He's getting the obvious mark, a Palaquin, and the Daemonheart from Crimson Slaughter (2+SV, IWND), obligatory Sigil of Corruption, and probably Lightning Claw/Powerfist. Haven't fully decided on weapons yet. If only I could give him FnP.

I also think I'm going to make this an unbound army. I just feel what is the point of a single Sorcerer against Grey Knights and Sisters? With the Aegis, Shield of Faith, and all the Warp Charges they can throw at denying, I feel that just 1 Chaos psyker is gonna be worthless. So I'm thinking of 2-3 Sorcerers. One would be ML3, aligned with Tzeentch, the others would be ML2, and all would roll on separate tables. Kinda like a Chaos Librarian Conclave.

Other than that, I may give the Dark Apostle a relic and the Daemon Prince will get a relic, armor, and I'm debating wings because the Favored of Chaos special rules need the Possessed to be within 12 inches, so flying around ruins it.

[gigasnail]

LOL, doesn't want to flood his chaos army with buffs. so funny.

[No One]

LordPathos said:

I just feel what is the point of a single Sorcerer against Grey Knights and Sisters? With the Aegis, Shield of Faith, and all the Warp Charges they can throw at denying, I feel that just 1 Chaos psyker is gonna be worthless. So I'm thinking of 2-3 Sorcerers. One would be ML3, aligned with Tzeentch, the others would be ML2, and all would roll on separate tables. Kinda like a Chaos Librarian Conclave.

Umm...there's a formation for that. Just take Cabal, which is just a conclave without the buffs (I mean, they do get a good power that they can sort of cast for free).

[LordPathos]

Oct 12, 2016 12:10:56 GMT No One said:

LordPathos said:

I just feel what is the point of a single Sorcerer against Grey Knights and Sisters? With the Aegis, Shield of Faith, and all the Warp Charges they can throw at denying, I feel that just 1 Chaos psyker is gonna be worthless. So I'm thinking of 2-3 Sorcerers. One would be ML3, aligned with Tzeentch, the others would be ML2, and all would roll on separate tables. Kinda like a Chaos Librarian Conclave.

Umm...there's a formation for that. Just take Cabal, which is just a conclave without the buffs (I mean, they do get a good power that they can sort of cast for free).

I did not know that was a thing. I will look into that.