First Chaos Games part 2

As I mentioned in yesterdays post Dave and I got a few games in this last weekend to try out the new Chaos dex for the first time.

For game 2 I busted out my Imperial Fists:

Lysander
Termie Librarian
10 Th/SS Termies
Rifle Dread
Rifle Dread
10 Marines w/ Las/Plas Razor
10 Marines w/ Las/Plas Razor
Typhoon
Typhoon
Whirlwind
Auto/HB Pred
Auto/HB Pred
Aegis w/ Quad

It is light on troops with the 4 combat squads but it has a ton of shots and a nasty death star moving across the table.   This game was big guns never tire and the diagonal deployment.

This game I got to go first and it was a bit brutal the first few turns.  I think I killed two of the walkers on turn one and started picking of noise marines right away.  Dave did not have much in the way of retaliation fire.   His cultists were getting killed by the Whirlwind but he was spaced out enough to not lose enough for LD checks.

By turn 2 his helldrake came in and smoke most of the marines that were maning the quad gun and another squad that was too close by them.  That was certainly foolish of me to do so, I guess I put too much hope in the quad gun intercepting the AV12 flier (I did manage a hull point).  His termies dropped and popped some meltas into the termies and the noise marines were downing one or two also.  His bike outflanked and killed one of my dreads I believe.

From there on it was a slug fest, with termies mulching through most of his troops while his bikes and terminators were working down my back field.  In the end of 7 he had cultists holding on to the back objective (3 vps) and I had no scoring units left.  We both and line breaker (1 vp) and our warlords alive and I had first blood (1 vp).  But Dave had killed all 3 of my heavies (3 vps)  and I had only killed his Forgefiend (1 vp) and not his Havocs or Oblits.  So another good victory for Dave 7-3.

Dave's army has some merrits that work well.  Fist off the Helldrake performed well both games.  I know people are saying AV 12 with one gun is not enough for the 170 pts but on a flier with 5++ and It Will Not Die that is nothing to sneeze at indeed!  Two of these could just wreck my entire bike army.  Hell one may be enough!

The forgefiend is interesting.  8 Str 8 shots at ap4 are pretty nice but he is BS3 and 175 points for a NON flier AV 12 with a 5++ and it will not die.  Maybe the two ectoplasma cannons would work, especially for an army like my 1ksons which generally suffer against 2+ armor.  But are they really any better than an AV 13 predator with BS 4 and lascannoned out for 140 points?  I'm not sure.

Certainly I am liking Dave's ability to take the Lord with the MoS and bikes to outflank.  I have always found that chaos lacks options to get to the backfield easily.  There are no drop pods and deepstriking is always a risk of course.  He is using the termies also which I used to do and may need to look at as well.  Though so long as I keep Ahriman getting Termies or oblits to infiltrate (and NOT outflank) might be ok.

The dreads are certainly improved from last edition and are cheap, but mileage may very.  The reaper + missile combo comes in at 120 points.  A predator with Auto/Las comes in for 5 points left.  That's two rerollable Str 7 and one Str 8 vs 2 Str 7 and 2 Str9.  If we're talking about popping vehicles and survivability from shooting I think I prefer the preds.

Dave's cheap 20 man cultist were far better than my minimally upgraded 10 man squad.  Granted he still spent more points overall on cultists, but I am not sure the 10 guys even in reserves are an option (unless maybe they are Zombies!).

The reaper havocs certainly have merit.  It does seem like the Flakk option is ridiculously over priced for these guys so that extra savings just goes to more str 7 shots.

So there we go on the first thoughts.  I'm not sure what to change on the current 1ksons list aside from maybe combining the cultists to one squad on the next go around.  Also I did not realize that you can only give one weapon upgrade to a Termie, so no Combi + fist type action, so I'll need to make a tweak there.  Gift of Mutation is still waiting for a verdict as well.

As much as I think I'd like to add a helldrake at his point I think I'd like a few games before I make cuts, though certainly the dreadnought and Apostle are looking like the first things to go.