Onslaught!

I want to start by thanking ward for all his hard work to put on another good event. I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I met a couple of great players and look forward to having a couple more games against them.

I was pleased because they was a very solid representation from a lot of xenos armies. Tyranids had five, necrons had 4, daemons were 3, 3 dark eldar and 3 eldar. The rest were a fairly eclectic mix of grey knight, blood angels and vanilla marines.

The scoring was evenly weighted between sportsmanship, presentation, and generalship. Secondaries were used to determine best general and votes were given out for best presentation and best sport. There were bonus points to be had if you followed a loose comp and had fluff, early submitted list etc.

I took my necrons for hopefully the last tournament for a long while. They are too efficient. First world problems, I know. They've become boring. After the initial set up of my army I would overhear "he's hear again" lol.  That being said I did go 4-0 with them, so credit has to be given.

Destroyer Lord: Scythe, Weave, Scarabs, Orb
Overlord: Scythe, Scarabs

10 Teslamortals: Haywiretek
10 Gaussmortals: Haywiretek, Night Scythe
5 Teslamortals
5 Teslamortals

10 Deathmarks: Despairtek, Nightscythe

7 Scarabs
7 Scarabs

Doomscythe
Annibarge
Annibarge

Game 1: Tyranids (Scouring, Vanguard Strike)

Hive Tyrant

3 Warriors
3 Warriors
10 Termagaunts
Tervigon

3 Hive Guard
3 Hive Guard
3 Zoanthropes

Trygon Prime
Dakkafex
Dakkafex

I lost first turn, but fortunately the objective weighting was in my favour. I made my bonehead move for the tourney and left my Annibarge vulnerable to hiveguard and he blew it up. I responded by having the big tesla unit go off for 23 hits and proceeded to melt the trygon.

The next couple of turns were him advancing into midfield. I managed to squeak by killing the tervigon with the deathmarks and polished off the monsterous creaures on that side. He played very defensively after the trygon dies which gave me board control and consquently the win.

Game 2: Dave Sinn's Imperial Guard (Emperor's Will, Dawn of War)

Company Command: Plasma and Chimera

Vet Squad: Plasma, Chimera
Vet Squad: Plasma, Chimera
Vet Squad: Plasma, Chimera
Vet Squad: Plasma, Chimera
Vet Squad: Melta, Chimera
Vet Squad: Melta, Chimera

Vendetta
Vendetta
Vendetta

Griffon
Griffon
Manticore

So looking at the army I needed my scarabs to drop the chimeras to keep him out of my deployment zone. Troop units in your enemy's DZ scored an additional 2 points. Unfortunately, this punk was packing three indirect firing ordanance blasts that instant kill scarabs. Tournament scenery being what it is I was fortunate to have a large building in my deployment zone. I rolled up the conqueror of cities so I had stealth on one of my scarab units. They actually did very little to his army in the game. I reserved everything else other than my annihilation barges.

Early game I pushed up the left side to get at his objective with my mounted immortal unit and to deal with his heavies. He pushed a little into midfield and blew up an annibarge with his vendettas for first blood, my objective had skyfire so the haywire cryptek with the teslamortals was a threat to the hovering vendettas in my backfield. Im pretty sure every plasma gunner killed himself putting shots down on the immortal unit in his backfield.  He had an abysmal turn of shooting trying to destroy an annihiliation barge and doom scythe. In the end, I contested the objective in his zone with a troop model getting the linebreaker bonuses. We lost track of time and dave graciously let me finish my turn for the massacre.

Game 3: Geoff's Grey Knights (Purge the Alien, Dawn of War)

Draigo

10 Strike Knights
10 Strike Knights
10 Srike Knights
7 Terminators
7 Terminators

Dreadknight: Heavy Incinerator and Heavy Psycannon

Hmmm, foot list with lots of strength 7 shooting and force weapons in a kill point mission. HELLLOO useless scarabs. Prepare to block.

I was expecting a straight up 24" gun fight with me running away from terminators. However, he decided to reserve the terminators, dreadknight and combat squad the majority of his strike squads keeping 2 half units for deepstrike. I would advise against this to minimize killpoints and to put a load of guns on the table turn 1.

I had turn one, I dropped a couple of marines for the loss of an annihilation barge. My deathmark unit came in and I managed to drop the rest of the the big strike squad with draigo. He retaliated with a dread knight into the destroyer lord, passed mindshackle and dropped him. I got back up and made the dreadknight punch itself in the face. The majority of his deepstriking units hit my deployment zone on the right side, I took the lead on kill points cleaning up the majority of the strike combat squads.

The game ended with me cleaning up the the strike squads and the dread knight and running away from the rest of his army blocking the termies with the scarabs. Minor win for me.

Game 4: Scott's Mech Blood Angels (Crusade 4 Objectives Vanguard)

Librarian
4 Plasma Honour Guard in Rhino
Furioso Frag Cannon Drop Pord
Furioso Frag Cannon
10 Assault Marines in Land Raider
5 Assault Marines in Rhino
5 Assault Marines in Razorback
Baal Pred with assault Cannon
Baal Pred with assault Cannon
Stormraven
Vindicator

So I won first turn and gave it to him. He deployed to rush me across a pyramid in the middle. I was worried about the podding furioso blowing up the scarabs so I bubblewrapped them with my troops. His pod arrived outside of a safe distance from the scarabs however the baal preds put the beat down on one unit so I lost first blood. He managed to tie up one of my big troop choices with the podded dread but the other scarab unit came to the rescue and finally managed to bring it down.

Scott then split his force with the land raider filled with the big unit and the razorback assault marines on one side and the gun tanks plus honour guard and other assault squad on the other.  With him having so few troops I felt that I could prioritize them  and then play keep away with the objectives. My doom scythe came in and blew up both baals, the vindi and the troops transport in one shot. The deathmarks did very little this game only managing to pot shot the odd model, the destroyer lord managed to get a hold of the librarians squad and slowly wittle it down. I made a stupid mistake and left the gauss squad plus overlord open to a charge from a furioso in a storm raven so that was their demise.

The game came down to the two objectives in my deployment zone. One was held by the big immortal squad, and it got charged by the honour guard and his other troop squad. The assault marines came out on top only to get blown away by an annihilation barge at the bottom of 7.  The other objective was held by the little 5 man immortal unit. They all took wounds from a storm ravens plasma cannon, multimelta and missiles. I went to ground in the open and saved one to win the game. Too close.

Epilogue

So I went 4-0-0 in the tournament and thought I had placed myself well for a shot at best overall, but I was to be denied. Mr. Dan Byers and his Raven Guard, counts as blood angels snatched it away from me. He beat me by one point. Had I written some background story for my necrons I wouldve tied him and therefore have beaten him on the generalship tiebreaker. I have to say, I really disagree with the secondary system implemented in the tournament. This is the only tournament that I know of that doesn't award its best general trophy to the person who won all of their games. They take the unbalanced bonus objectives into account to determine the winner. Oh well. Otherwise, this is a great tournament that I would recommend to anyone.

List: Plague Zombie

Im still trying to come up with a death guard list I like. I keep coming to the conclusion that the best troops are the ones that are the cheapest and leave the heavy lifting for the rest of the army.  I was listening to a great 40k podcast, the 11th company, and the TO for NOVA, Mike Brandt, was talking about how the best defence for an army is to throw a monkey wrench (read as fast moving assault threats) into the opponents plan. He also talked about putting an army on the table that really doesn't care about casualties (his favourite armies are horde guard, orks and nids).  With this in mind I have come up with this.

Typhus

Daemon Prince

-Nurgle, Wings, Armour, Black Mace

19 Plague Zombies

20 Plague Zombies

20 Plague Zombies

20 Plague Zombies

4 Nurgle Spawn

4 Nurgle Spawn

Heldrake

-Baleflamer

2 Nurgle Obliterators

2 Nurgle Obliterators

Maulerfiend

-Lashertendrils

Total: 1750pts

This list is hyper agressive. By turn two I should have the spawn units, the heldrake, the daemon prince and the maulerfiend all up in my opponents bacon. This should keep the attention off my zombie horde.  1850 I would like add an aegis with a quad gun......hey zombies still have a BS. 

Power Build: Cult of Nurgle

Hey everyone, I've got another nurgle list for you. This one is taking advantage of Epidemius as an Ally. When he is on the board, any model killed by any follower of Nurgle (daemon or simply marked unit) adds to a tally. Once the tally reaches certain levels, bonuses are bestowed on those units. The bonuses are amaaaazing, like all followers now wound on twos, or all attacks made from nurgle followers ignore armour saves (shooting included). Im going to include the chart for clarity.

0-4: Nothing
5-9: Plagueswords wound on a 3+
10-14: All followers of nurgle close combat attacks wound on 2+
15-19: All followers of nurgle who have feel no pain now feel no pain on a 3+
20+: All attacks made by followers of nurgle ignore armour saves

With this in mind, I want to set about building an army that will build that tally fast, and have the right models benefit at the right time. I like looking at this army concept like a 2-stage rocket. First, you need your shooters to pump up the tally so your close combat units wound on 2's who, in the second stage, will vault the tally up to the fnp boost and all attacks ignore saves buff.

First Stage

Fortunately, Mr. Kelly made it so everything and their moms can get marked in the new book. The first things that jump out at me are the Obliterators. Marked with nurgle, they are 76pts a pop but can give me the utility to open transports or drop plasma cannon templates on the enemy. I want 2 units of two.

2 Obliterators: Nurgle @ 152pts

2 Obliterators: Nurgle @ 152pts

I also am really liking bike lords this addition, and with the mark of nurgle this guy is toughness 6. The Burning Brand of Skalathrax is a torrent AP3 flamer template so with bike movement and the 12" torrent range I can really put some early pressure on the enemy. He doesn't need anything defensive because as long as he's moving he has a 5+ cover.

Chaos Lord: Nurgle, Bike, BBoS, Power Weapon, Gift of Mutation @ 155pts

Second Stage

The chaos lord needs a body guard of some kind who can keep up then detach to pummel in close combat and boost that tally rapidly, especially if they are wounding on two's. I really dig spawn in this codex, and they can be marked. Toughness 6 beasts with rage, fearless and lots of damage potential. 2 units should work fine.

5 Spawn: Nurgle @ 180pts

5 Spawn: Nurgle @ 180pts

Benefactors and Support

The real benefactors of all these buffs are plague marines. With all those buffs, they'll be unstoppable by the time they hit midfield around turn 4.

14 Plague Marines: 2 Plasma Guns, Meltabomb @ 371pts

14 Plague Marines: 2 Plasma Guns, Meltabomb @ 371pts

I also want a suitable bodyguard for Epidemius because if he dies those perks disappear. He's fearless so all I want and can afford at this point are cultists to jump in front of him. I also want another unit to sit around and take an objective. 

20 Cultists @ 90pts

10 Cultists @ 50pts

We can't forget about Epidemius and his Plaguebearer tax. Under the daemonic assault rules, independent characters can join units in reserve and be treated as a single unit for splitting purposes so I'm guaranteed to get him first turn. So they'll deepstrike somewheres in my backfield and then 2nd turn epidemius will join the clutist blob, while the plaguebearers shamble towards another local objective.

Epidemius @ 110pts

5 Plaguebearers @ 75pts

Adding it up, 1886. One spawn is 36pts, how convenient. Consider him dropped. The lord will run with the smaller unit to equal the killing power.

Final Draft

Chaos Lord: Nurgle, Bike, BBoS, Power Weapon, Gift @ 155pts

14 Plague Marines: 2 Plasma Guns, Meltabomb @ 371pts

14 Plague Marines: 2 Plasma Guns, Meltabomb @ 371pts

20 Cultists @ 90pts

10 Cultists @ 50pts

5 Spawn: Nurgle @ 180pts

4 Spawn: Nurgle @ 144pts

2 Obliterators: Nurgle @ 152pts

2 Obliterators: Nurgle @ 152pts

Epidemius @ 185pts

5 Plaguebearers @ 75pts

Total: 1850pts

Scoring Units: 5

Kill Points: 11

Model Count: 78

Chaos Review: Headquarters

I am super thrilled that GW has finally understood that if you're going to make HQ choices hand to hand monsters, that you need to make them cheap! Some characters in the list can get pretty pricey, but it comes with some force mulitpliers.  

Abaddon

This guy should not lose a challenge to anyone or anything.  Having two different weapons that suit different purposes like instakilling wraiths to wholesale removal of terminator units is really neat. Combining his preferred enemy warlord trait with the boatloads of special weapons that chosen can bring to field is entertaining. He counts as having every mark so will benefit from Icons FYI.

Huge price tag and slow movement are his downsides.

Rating: 4/5 (build specific)

Huron

Not the greatest in combat and no real extra survivability, but his real advantage comes with the guarantee of Master of Deception. The Hamadrya is a cool bonus giving access to Divination. Hes reasonably priced as well.

Rating: 3/5 (build specific)

Kharn

Close combat monsters are a dime a dozen in this codex and can be done for cheaper than Kharn. If fighting space marines, the betrayer rule shouldn't come into effect thanks the VotLW. His utility effectively prevents his unit to be targeted with psychic powers. The warlord trait makes his unit more killy. How dead do you need a unit though? 

Rating: 2/5

Ahriman

We have our first masterly level 4 psyker (didnt take too long). Im happy its him though. This guy is 230pts and worth every penny. Master of deception as standard warlord trait for the force multiplier, fearless for cultist bunkering and a disgusting arsenal of psychic powers to have. 

I wish they updated his model though.....that's my only downside.

Rating: 5/5

Typhus

Here is another one of my personal favourites in the HQ slot. He's a beatstick that's also a level 2 psyker. He unlocks arguably the best cult unit in the codex (noise marines make a good case) and plague zombies. I cannot stress enough how much it irks me that I can only take ten man squads of zombies. How does a model company think that restricting squad sizes is a good idea?! Rant for another post. He is incredibly resilient, just keep him away from anything strength 10 and he should come out on top.

Rating: 5/5

Lucius

One of my favourite HH characters that is a nonissue in 40k. No extra survivability, Can't kill terminators effectively, only decent in challenges. Upsides are that he does have a doom siren and unlocks Noise Marines. Chaos Lords are cheaper taxes to pay for Noise Marines.

Rating: 1/5

Fabius Bile

165pts for someone who buffs one squad of CSM, and cannot preform well in a challenge when he has to. I dont see value. Slaanesh sorcerer will provide a better buffs.

Rating: 1/5

Chaos Lord

Already have daemon princes from 5th? Too bad, they made Chaos Lords the best buy. The options that these guys have is awesome. They come with fearless standard so you can save 25 points off Icon's of vengeance or can use a cultist squad as an escort into battle. Lords are the only choice (outside of thousand sons and sorcs) that unlock the cult units as troops. Daemon Princes dont, They can buy mounts like the juggernaught and slaanesh for quick delivery into the enemy army. Take the juggernaught btw. Or a Palanquin to make a nurgle lord near impossible to kill. Lots of versatility. BTW, there is simply never a reason to take a lord of tzeentch.

Rating: 5/5

Sorcerer

110pts for a level 3 psyker. Tzeentch has some great destructive spells, but are better utilized on a daemon prince. You generally want to keep these guys away from combat. They lost a wound and dont have the combat prowess to guarantee challenge survival. If you're looking to run an undivided force this guy should be the first thing you look at.

Rating: 4/5

Daemon Prince

This guy has limited builds and racks up points very quickly. I like nurgle for the mark with some CC ability. Keep in mind he is only ld 9 so if you want to buy psychic powers make sure to pick up that spell familiar. His stats are the only thing redeeming this guy. WS9 means marines are hitting him on 5
's and his In8 makes sure they dont run away just to shoot you.

Rating: 3/5

Dark Apostle

I dont think there is any reason as to why you would take this guy over a lord or sorcerer. He is priced too highly. Shouldve been an elite slot.

Rating: 1/5

Warpsmith

Same thing with the apostle. The chances of him actually doing anything useful is slim to nil. Too expensive. Wish he was an elite slot, or at least allowed a second fortification.

Rating: 1/5

Conclusion

I think they did a real service to lords and sorcerers. With the changes to fearless, chaos lords in a squad of cultists is not a liability, they can reliably get up the board and after the lord wipes a unit they can take the ground and let him wander off to do his thing. The return of wargear gives these guys a much needed 4+ invul. The availability of the 3rd mastery level to a generic sorcerer is a cool perk and makes telepathy and slaanesh excellent lores to use. Daemon Princes, Apostles and warpsmiths were left out in the cold due to poor pricing.

Up next: TROOPS!

Build Request: Alpha Legion

I have been asked to see what I can do for a themed alpha legion army using the new chaos space marines book and with as much raptor, cultist, apostle, warp talon, maulerfiend and chosen. I think alpha legion have been spoiled for theme choices with this new incarnation, you just have to be creative and use a little imagination. Im going to omit the warp talons, maulerfiends and chosen. They work in different types of lists. Warp talons simply dont fit the theme well and cant take advantage of the way this army plays without losing on the blind ability. Chosen are also the weaker choice with shorter range, not scoring ever and high cost. Maulerfiends are fun, but with so much combat already in the list, they will a. lack targets and b. occupy now valuable heavy support slots necessary to down threats and transports the maulers cant reach in time.

The first thing I think of when I think Alpha Legion is infiltrate. None of the units in this book have it specifically (poor chosen), however, there is a warlord trait that makes D3 units infiltrate. You can try chancing it with a generic character roll on the chart or you can stretch the imagination a bit and take on of the special characters that get it standard. We're going to pass over Ahriman and look at Huron.

Huron gives us the infiltrate rules as well as a little utility with the hamadrya. Convert up your own lord to match the weapons and his pet and voila.The little lizard (lizard, alpha legion, present from the Cabal, etc tell me how this doesnt work fluff wise) gives chaos its only acces to the divination discipline but no prescience. Still a great discipline and more utility is what we want.

Huron @160pts

With our HQ out of the way, I want to look next at what will best ultilize the infiltrate ability.  Because, jump units follow the rules for both the parent type (in this case infantry) and Jump Infantry , jump infantry qualify for the infiltrate ability. This opens up first turn charges if the chaos player is going second. On his request list, raptors fit the bill nicely.  With dedicated assault units, you need to go big or go home because they are going to take some firepower going in and after they blow up the first unit theyll likely take another round to the face. Marks allow us to have both speed and resilience with the mark of slaanesh and its icon, +1 Initiative and feel no pain are an awesome tandem on assault units.  Veteran is also important here to make sure they stay put. We'll take two units and play for the averages.

15 Raptors @ 380pts
-Slaanesh, Icon of Excess, Veterans, 1 Meltagun, Lightning Claw
15 Raptors @ 380pts
-Slaanesh, Icon of Excess, Veterans, 1 Meltagun, Lightning Claw

Now onto our troops. With Chaos Lords, Im normally an advocate for giving them a daemon weapon, throwing them in a unit of cultists for ablative wounds, but with Huron I wouldn't say he has the Killing Power to take units on his own so lets take a larger squad of marines.

10 Chaos Marines @ 233pts
-Khorne, Icon of Wrath, 2 hand weapons, 2 Meltaguns, Power Sword

For the remainder of scoring, were simply going to abuse the cheapness of cultists. 4 Times. These will go in reserve and make their way toward objectives and go to ground. If we have the points by the end of this we will take an Apostle, consolidate 2 units into one and use the blob more agressively.

10 Cultists @ 50pts
10 Cultists @ 50pts
10 Cultists @ 50pts
10 Cultists @ 50pts

Looking at this we have spent 1353 leaving us with 495ish to play with our heavy support choices.  We really need something to at least make flyers nervous and can open up transports at range. I like havocs, but flakk havocs are super expensive and will simply be the first target of any flier. So Im looking at the forgefiend. 8 Str. 8 shots will scare flyers and will reliable wreck tansports. They also have the head of a Komodo Dragon (lizard/theme). I want two.

Forgefiend @ 175pts
Forgefiend @ 175pts

127pts to spend. Lets drop the meltaguns down to flamers on the Khorne Marines  and consolidate two of the cultist squads into one. Lets purchase that Apostle. He gives the whole unit fearless and hatred and with the mark of khorne now gains counterattack. Lets give him the Axe of blind fury to make this unit actually scary.

Dark Apostle @ 150pts
-Mark of Khorne, Axe of Blind Fury

We've got 7 points left over so lets give the Marine Champ a meltabomb. Lets final draft this thang.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Huron Blackheart

Dark Apostle
-Khorne, Axe of Blind Fury

10 Chaos Marines
-Khorne, Icon of Wrath, 2 Hand weapons, 2 Flamers, Power Weapon, Meltabomb

20 Cultists

10 Cultists

10 Cultists

15 Raptors
-Slaanesh, Icon of Excess, Veteran, Meltagun, Lightning Claw


15 Raptors
-Slaanesh, Icon of Excess, Veteran, Meltagun, Lightning Claw

Forgefiend

Forgefiend

Total: 1848pts



Enjoy!

Damnation of Toreus: Initial List

I'm starting this escalating narrative campaign at the beginning of November and I'm going to use it to get my Chaos marines finished for the new year. The campaign is turn based and takes place on a planetary empires map. you have your home base of course, but there are some special tiles that can grant you either an extra Fast Attack, or Heavy Support, or whatever. I'm likely not going to stray outside of the standard force org too much, but the initial org chart your given is VERY limiting.

1 HQ

2 TROOPS

1 ELITE

1 FAST ATTACK

1 HEAVY

The campaign starts out a 1000pts so I am trying to get my initial list finalized and painted for the first turn.

Daemon Prince

-nurgle, wings, armour, black mace

15 Chaos Marines

-nurgle, veteran, 2 hand weapon, 2 meltagun, lightning claw, meltabomb

21 Cultists

5 Spawn

-nurgle

Forgefiend

My shooting in this list is a little lackluster, but on 4x4 boards there isn't a place one could really run to get away from Uncle Gespacho, the daemon prince, and his band of merry spawn. I just need something to open up any transports to expose the gooey nougat inside, hence the forgefiend. Cultists are there for moral support.

Chaos Review: Part I

New blog and a new book, it's a match made in heaven.

The review will be in 3 parts. The first part will look at the structure, background and army wide special rules. The second will analyze the different force org slots and wargear options. The third will bring it all together to see what

I'll lead with this; all praise the Kelly!

Structure

This is the first codex release for 6th edition and with it comes a couple of welcome changes. First is hardcover. This is done to match the fantasy counterparts and inexpensively add value to the book. With the hardcover also comes full colour, which is excellent as all the artwork is outstanding; nothing wasted on Blanche's ''style." I know a lot of people were ranting about the price of this book, the paper and hardcover and colour make it worthwhile. I love picking up this book to read. Its reassuring in the way only hardcovers can be.

Its layout is pretty similiar: table of content, background stories which I wont spoil, Chaos Special Rules, Unit Bestiary, Wargear/equipment/psychic disciplines, colour photos of the models, Wargear table (eeeeeeee!!), army list, and reference section.

Ok, the wargear table is back. Anyone who's been around for more than 6 years will remember the wargear table of old. What it represents is the myriad of options that have come back to chaos characters. They design team was obviously not happy with the work gav and alessio did on the last chaos codex where they removed so much choice for the sake of balance. They have made up for it in spades.

I want to elaborate what they did for the reference section, the put all the necessary rules and tables onto this 3 page foldout at the back so you're not flipping through looking for a rule; and believe me, there are a lot of special rules. This is super handy because you only need this section for 99% of the questions you'll encounter in a game.

Background

The background has been not so much advanced as fleshed out near the end.  The timeline has been brought in line with the Blood Angels Codex where the end is about to occur. Abaddon is about to launch his final crusade on Terra and he has a diabolical plan to do it.

Extra attention was given to a whole founding of chapters and there attempts to purge the doubts and accusations on them that ends in tragedy and rebellion. Lots of cool, potential, narrative campaign concepts are there.

Army Rules

Champion of Chaos - Models with this rule have to issue a challenge or accept if one has been issued against. This is one of those rules that is meant to increase the narrative/cinematic side of the game. However, it falls short because of a lack of cooperation with the main ruleset. While chaos characters are pretty lethal in combat, its very simple for the opponent to decline to deny the boon roll in exchange for losing a couple of attacks. The boon table is pretty neat, nothing game breaking, but no real downside until your lord turns into a spawn or daemon prince. Even then, hes still alive and your enemy is down a character. Most of the time you'll end up with a benefit for combat you really didn't need, but on the rare occasions that you roll up instant death attacks or d3+1 more rolls on the chart, you can actually make a mountain out of a molehill.

Warlord Traits - Chaos now present us with the first race specific warlord table and the first word that comes to mind here is consistent. Just like the main rule set there are a couple of gems and a couple of duds. I like how they didn't restrict chaos players to this one unless they are using a special character (more later).  Fear and Flames being next to worthless while black crusader and master of deception can be right mean. Roughly half the armies you come across are going to have that marine special rule so preferred enemy in a 24" bubble is wicked mean. Master of deception opens up some first turn charges if you're going second or some very early board control if going first.

Daemon Weapons - The super smash bro hammers are back again with some major tweaks. Functionally, the daemon weapons work the same with the extra d6 attacks; however, if you roll a one now you still get to attack but your weapon skill is reduced to one for the phase.  There are no longer generic daemon weapons but rather 2 artifacts an HQ can buy. We'll get into those later.

Veteran of the Long War - This special rule was added so that legion players would stop their bitching a bit! I kid, kind of. The rule grants +1 ld and hatred (space marines) reroll hits in the first round.  The ld bonus is what most people will be after as the fearless icon is rather expensive and on a combat unit, ld 10 is often enough. Since half the armies you fight will likely be space marines, having that little buff is nice and can help generate some rolls on the boon table.

Marks of Chaos

These really haven't changed too much, but they have brought back the god animosity. If you're marked you may not join a unit with a different mark. This would appear limiting, but everyone and their mom can get marks in this book so its not bad at all. Nurgle, tzeentch, and slaanesh havent changed outside of psykers with the mark must take at least one power from that discipline. They offer +1 toughness, +1 Invuln, and +1 Initiative respectively. Khorne is where you see the big change with the granting of the two USRs counterattack and rage. Counterattack is the important one where even if he is the only one in the unit with that rule, everyone else in the squad gets to use it.

Independently, these marks make for nice and often expensive bonuses. Where they really come into their own is that they open up the use of icons and can combo very well. That we will leave till the next part of the review.