Chaos Rumors

Hello, readers! I stumbled across the following rumors a few days ago, and thought I’d share them, as well as offer my thoughts on them. As with all rumors, they must be taken with a grain of salt…

“The Chaos Space Marine codex is the only 40k codex for this year. It is not going to be divided into two codexes or anything special. This is not the return 3.5 codex everyone has been wanting [,] this is more a clean up than anything else.
With that said let us get started.

-Troops choices will be Chaos Space Marines and Cultists
-All Cult Marines are Elites
-No new Special Characters
-Special Characters will unlock Cult Marines as troops (Kharn for Berserkers and so on)
-Typhus makes Cultists into Zombies
-Chaos Dreadnaught is removed and replaced with a new unit (like how pariahs were replaced with Lychguard)
-CSM now get a Flyer a Mechanical Chaos Dragon (model is done will be part of initial release)
-Lesser and Greater Demons are gone
-Spawn replaced by ‘Fell Beast’
-Rules for Traitor Guard are in!”

Having taken a deep breath, I’m going to discuss each rumor one by one, trying not to suffer an attack of nerd rage:

-CSM and Cultists for troops:
I see nothing wrong with this. I’ve been disappointed about the lack of cultists since I started playing Chaos, so this is something I hope is true. I imagine Cultists will be like grots for this army, used to hold objectives and screen your armored, warped killing machines. I would wager that Cultists will have stats like Conscripts, but get a bonus to stats depending on the icon they carry, or the mark the ‘general’ is carrying.

-Cult troops as elites:
This is a bit of a throw-back, which is mildly disappointing. I feel bad for people who have made whole armies based on Cult troops, but combined with the other rumors, this won’t hurt them too much. I just hope there’s improvements to some of the units.

-No more special characters:
This is a total bummer, and I’m going to distrust this one. I was hoping there would be some characters for Iron Warriors, Night Lords, Alpha Legion, and maybe the return of Cypher. It makes sense they would cap the special characters, because they’re not going to sell a ton of them, and having too many of them makes it harder to sell the army.

-Characters unlocking Cult troops:
This makes total sense when we see that Cult troops will be elites. I imagine lords with marks will be able to take one unit of Cult troops, while characters will allow no limit on them. When you get right down to it, there’s been almost no reason to take characters as HQ choices, because they offer very little. I hope Abbadon makes Terminators troops as well. The question that comes to my mind is: will Lucius or Fabius make Noise Marines troops? I guess we’ll find out this summer. Typhus making Cultists into zombies is pretty freaking sweet.

-Dreadnaught is out:
I’m going to call bullshit on this one. Is it possible? Yes, it very well could be true. But, I have trouble believing it is. There’s really no reason for it. Dreads are an established part of the fluff and robbing us of them is pretty lame. I also have a personal stake in this, as I converted an AoBR Dread to Chaos. It looks nice, but I haven’t had much reason to use it.

-Flying dragon… Thing:
Okay. I don’t know what to make of this one. It wouldn’t surprise me if this turns out to be spot-on. The only thing I would want is that it be something like a Stormraven or Valkyrie, a flying transport. I don’t like being limited to use rhinos and Land Raiders.

-No more Daemons:
I think this one has been running around since the release of the last codex, with a spike after the Daemons codex. Again, hoping this isn’t true, but won’t be surprised if it is. I suppose my Daemonettes will become Cultists…

-No more Spawn:
My question is this: Why? Why remove or change this unit? Doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. It doesn’t affect me at all, it’s just odd.

-Traitor Guard:
This could be cool, but I wonder why they want to do this. It’s either going to be conversion heavy or they’ll have to limit the amount of this unit. If this unit does appear and is worth picking up, I’ll gladly use them. This is could also be something like Scouts that loyalist marine armies have.

I don’t want to come across as some terrible nerd, weeping Mtn. Dew-favored tears of rage. On the whole, if all of these rumors come to pass, I won’t be pissed off. This isn’t a case of “My Precious Army” being destroyed. In fact, Chaos Marine players will come out ahead. Access to some low cost cannon fodder, special characters that actually do something, and a chance to bring their armies a bit closer to the fiction. Sure, I won’t be jumping for joy when they remove some of the units I have, rendering them useless. But, look back at the Imperial Guard codex: It was an amazing change that did more good than harm. I was personally screwed, because my Ogryns and Stormtroopers had been hit pretty hard, but I got combined squads, awesome characters and a ton of new units in the deal. We have to take the good with bad, I guess. And, be glad that Chaos is getting an update. On that note, I hope Tau are next on the update list.

Now, I’m going to discuss my own wishlist and fixes I would like to see. The following is all based on my own personal thoughts, and I’m not claiming to have an inside source in Games Workshop. If these pop up as rumors, feel free to link to this post and make the poster eat his/her words:

-Drop pods and etc:
As I mentioned above, the Chaos forces really lack from a variety of transports when compared to their loyalist cousins. When you turn rogue, do you just forget how to use a drop pod or Razorback? I think not. The codex even mentions a warband that uses drop pods! They don’t have to be drop pods, you can make them Dreadclaws if it helps you sleep at night.

-And They Shall Know No Fear:
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought the last codex had this for Chaos Marines. I don’t see why they don’t, but maybe it’s too powerful for the army. Not going to argue too much about this point, but I just wanted to dream for a bit.

-Power of Machine Spirit:
While I’m dreaming, let’s toss this in there. Well, maybe not. I like Possessed vehicles more that this, I think.

-Raptors:
I have a small unit of Raptors I use as a retinue/meat shield for my Sorcerer. I bring them along when I’m facing a unit with high mobility, like Tau, or limited mobility, like old Necrons and any non-mechanized army. They do a fair job of protecting my Sorcerer and hop around the battlefield like bats from Hell. The problem is that they’re over priced, and they have really crappy options. Drop the price to 15 points, let me take special weapons without losing my pistols, and maybe help out their deep strike, and you’ll have an awesome unit. I bet the weapon thing will be changed, and I hope the price will drop. I won’t hold my breath for anything else.

-Bikers:
Let’s face it, Chaos bikers are over priced and have some of the same problems as Raptors, with losing hand weapons to get special weapons. If they dropped to 25, or even 30 points, they would be so much more useful. With the models being expensive as well, I can only dream of using them.

-Possessed:
Oh, god. There’s so much wrong with Possessed Marines. No guns, only one close combat weapon, random abilities that get rolled AFTER deployment and costing 26 points a pop, they’re worthless. I think only Dreadnaughts are even more worthless, but I find more uses for them that my Possessed. I love the models, they look amazing when painted. There’s a bunch of different ways to help these guys out. The smallest one is to allow players to roll for the Daemonkin before they deploy, so you can take advantage of the Scout result if you get it. I would also give them bolt pistols, grenades and maybe Fleet. If you could drop the point cost, as to 20, it would also help them without having to change much else. If I could re-do the unit, I’d drop the points, give them the grenades and pistols, then let you buy the abilities you want. Maybe just one of them, maybe more. That would create a far more effective unit, having them fill gaps in the army.

Dare to dream, I know. I suppose we’ll all find out what will be in the codex this summer when it’s released. I know I’ll have a copy reserved down at the local game store. I just hope I don’t have an aneurism in the store while I read it…

To end on a happier note, I’m planning on having my Chaos Marine army fully painted by the time the codex drops. Just in time to buy and paint more!