So as we have heard the rumours, might as well put this into perspective. A New Chaos Space Marine Codex! Awesome! Is it Iron Warrior? Word Bearer? Night Lords? A better Thousand Sons? wait... Crimson Slaughters? Who are they...
Yes it turns out that our greatly and well wished for Codex is apparently the Crimson Slaughterers, who ever these guys actually are. I only heard about them in the 5th edition codex and that was from a paint scheme so that is about as much depth I know of about them. So, lets ask ourselves, is this worth it? Well I will say hell no for one. At a brilliantly priced £30 supplement book, that I thought was only a painting scheme does seem a little rash, also with what they bring to the Codex. Guess what! It makes a different unit of Elites Troops choices! well which ones do you ask?
Possessed Marines, yes there is no other way to say this than the least used, bought or sold unit in the chaos marine arsenal, well isn't that delightful. But we want to do some justice so lets look at how the unit would play out as a troops choice instead of a never used option in the elite choices. For picking my scoring units I look for certain things I want, if the unit doesn't have it then I look elsewhere, so here we go.
Survivability: Ok, so we start off extremely well here, with Fearless within the base cost of the possessed marine, they will never run away and will be annoying to knock off objectives. With there 5++ they are annoying even for the task of AP3 weapons. Check!
Maneuverability: Again this unit scores well with Fleet, allowing them to bound quickly from place to place and get to where they need to be, and for troops this isn't bad at all. Check!
Fire Support: Ok, this is a down side to possessed. No guns. I always like the idea that my little scoring units can add a little helping hand into the fray with a few bolters here, perhaps a cheeky special weapon there, but these guys don't get that chance. So it is a small fail here.
Cost: 130 points for five guys. Hmm, that is one of the most expensive base unit for troops you can get, even surpassing the Plague Marines (assuming they are troops), which stand at higher with Survivability and Fire Support than the Possessed, so what do we do? 130 points on a five man squad in a tournament game is a lot of points, three units of these will put you at 500 points for 15 scoring models, whilst a standard marine can heft in a meaty 30 guys in units of 5, much better in my opinion.
Upgrades: Possessed cannot take much in the manor of upgrades, but each does help you to varying degrees. Marks, icons and Boons of Don't Bother Using Them (DBUT). These are all pricey (for the good ones) and will see your unit bashing around 150 points, getting them in line for equivalent points value as a five man Thousand Sons unit. Dare say that I think Thousand sons are more worth there points than these?
Now, the specialty of these guys is close combat, not very good for 6th edition or a scoring unit in my opinion. But it is where they shine the most (or should shine). With a nice little D3 random table to make them ever so unreliable they get some special gifts. Basically Shred, AP3 or +1 to attacks and Initiative. Not a riptide 3++ by far, but it is a little something. However, ask yourselves are you going to ever role on this table? for your scoring units that need to sit on objectives in 5 out of 6 games? That is the last place mine end up, and usually because something hasn't died the turn I wanted it to.
With my hand on heart I declare this as fluffy nonsense that should not be used for competitive gameplay, if something nice comes out of the Chaos Artifacts you can always ignore the possessed marines just like you did or ally them in to borrow them goodies.
That is all for tonight, got a wedding to go to in the morning (not mine) So everyone enjoy being disappointed with the supplement and have fun!
No comments:
Post a Comment