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Hello. I'm not sure if I'm posting in the correct forum, but I'm looking to put my 2nd edition chaos codex to use. Does anybody here have any tactics advice or list suggestions they would like to share? Cut throat cheese is more then welcome. I'm going up against Eldar, Space Marines, and Tyranids if that helps.

People used to take Mark of Khorne with terminator armour, which supposedly made the terminator save 2+ on 2d6, but I'm not sure why. MoK says that it gives the character a 2+ save and doesn't say anything about it being possible to combine it with terminator armour. If your group plays it like that, it's a strong combination. Praise of Khorne also lets you reroll failed armour saves, essentially making your champion immortal.

They clarified in an FAQ that 'Chaos Armour' is power armour, terminators (aside from Abaddon) don't get the +1.

Although it's worth pointing out that a 2+ armour save for Terminators wouldn't make the model invulnerable thanks to save modifiers.

Going up against Eldar, you’re gonna have your work cut out for you. Because Eldar were super hard in 2nd Ed.

Things to gun down on sight? Howling Banshees, Warp Spiders. Just do it. Get it done and get them ded, otherwise they will kick your arse all over the board.

One of the challenges of 2nd ed. Chaos is that they are vehicle light. Everyone else gets 50% of support, Chaos only gets 25%. That means you either get tanks and have to walk or a mobile army without big guns.

Happily, Chaos does have demons, and those can be quite decisive. I recall a lovely game where an IG player didn't realize the danger of parking tanks right next to each other so when my Bloodthirster charged in between them, it was pure carnage. Many skulls taken.

In 2nd, remember to tailor your forces to the missions, which in my group we work out in advance. Makes better battles and stories. I tend to think of all 2nd ed. armies in terms of maneuver elements, and even on the defensive ("Hold the Line") you need the ability to shift your forces (or at least your firepower).

I do love the Chaos Dreadnought weapon options. The power scourge makes even genestealers pause before charging into it.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
One of the challenges of 2nd ed. Chaos is that they are vehicle light. Everyone else gets 50% of support, Chaos only gets 25%. That means you either get tanks and have to walk or a mobile army without big guns.

Happily, Chaos does have demons, and those can be quite decisive. I recall a lovely game where an IG player didn't realize the danger of parking tanks right next to each other so when my Bloodthirster charged in between them, it was pure carnage. Many skulls taken.

In 2nd, remember to tailor your forces to the missions, which in my group we work out in advance. Makes better battles and stories. I tend to think of all 2nd ed. armies in terms of maneuver elements, and even on the defensive ("Hold the Line") you need the ability to shift your forces (or at least your firepower).

I do love the Chaos Dreadnought weapon options. The power scourge makes even genestealers pause before charging into it.

A greater daemon and a dreadnought are certainly things I'm interested in fielding. My only concerns are about the required move and charge rules for both those units.

I was thinking of bringing some veterans for some infiltrating firepower.

 insaniak wrote:
They clarified in an FAQ that 'Chaos Armour' is power armour, terminators (aside from Abaddon) don't get the +1.

Although it's worth pointing out that a 2+ armour save for Terminators wouldn't make the model invulnerable thanks to save modifiers.

Accoring to polish forums the problem with khorn lords in terminator armour wasn't the fact that they had a +2d6 save on a +2, but the fact that until they would re-roll any failed saves from Praise of Khorn, which combined with a displacer field or power generator ment they were very hard to kill outside of eldar style auto remove weapons or vortex. From what is listed the armies consisted of khorn demons for regeneration and ease of summon, 4 man veteran squads for the 99pts cost unit which were worth 0VP, something that could cast gate so the charge range of berzerkers and the lord grew to 24"+. Everything else seems to be considered too casual and too weak/expensive to be worth running. Nurgle stuff is really slow, slanesh stuff doesn't do anything to tanks, but some people disagree and say that a fiend lord with "combat drugs" (not sure if this is a rule or gear options) are okeyish. Big demons are too hard to summon, especialy the named versions. There also seem to be lists that run like 200 cultists and lords, but most people response to that is calling the person that proposed it very bad names I can't use on this forum. So I assume it is not socialy acceptable to do same as the 200 hormaguant army.

Karol wrote:

 insaniak wrote:
They clarified in an FAQ that 'Chaos Armour' is power armour, terminators (aside from Abaddon) don't get the +1.

Although it's worth pointing out that a 2+ armour save for Terminators wouldn't make the model invulnerable thanks to save modifiers.

Accoring to polish forums the problem with khorn lords in terminator armour wasn't the fact that they had a +2d6 save on a +2, but the fact that until they would re-roll any failed saves from Praise of Khorn, which combined with a displacer field or power generator ment they were very hard to kill outside of eldar style auto remove weapons or vortex. From what is listed the armies consisted of khorn demons for regeneration and ease of summon, 4 man veteran squads for the 99pts cost unit which were worth 0VP, something that could cast gate so the charge range of berzerkers and the lord grew to 24"+. Everything else seems to be considered too casual and too weak/expensive to be worth running. Nurgle stuff is really slow, slanesh stuff doesn't do anything to tanks, but some people disagree and say that a fiend lord with "combat drugs" (not sure if this is a rule or gear options) are okeyish. Big demons are too hard to summon, especialy the named versions. There also seem to be lists that run like 200 cultists and lords, but most people response to that is calling the person that proposed it very bad names I can't use on this forum. So I assume it is not socialy acceptable to do same as the 200 hormaguant army.

Thanks for the info! Is it possible that there are some differences between the English and Polish rules for the game? In my book vets are 35 points a piece and a minimum squad of 3 would be 105. The only thing listed as giving 0 victory points for being wiped out that can find is characters who cost less then 50 points. I don't know what a fiend lord is but there is a combat drugs wargear card.

Karol wrote:
Big demons are too hard to summon, especialy the named versions.

If you plan on using a greater demon, take a disposable character with no wargear and possess them on the first turn. Obviously, battlefield placement is important, but the nice thing is that if your guy is hidden, he's unlikely to be whacked and of course the arrival of the demon will give you considerable tactical surprise.

Chaos Marine characters share the same strengths and weakness of all characters in this edition, the chief of which is that their greatest ability is hth combat, and to do that, one must achieve base-to-base contact. Similarly, "breaking" a unit doesn't do much if you aren't in base to base contact. A tried and true IG tactic is to voluntarily break units so that there are no friendly models in contact during your subsequent shooting phase. I mean, you can shoot into melee anyway, but this way you don't waste hits on your own troops.

For me, the fun thing about Chaos is the ability to tailor it to the needs of a campaign. So including cultists, or demons or renegades gives you tons of options.

By the sounds of it it may be more worthwhile to Run the Khorne Daemon World list and just take some Chaos Marines as allies. No need for summoning points or sacrificial champions at all.

spectre041 wrote:
By the sounds of it it may be more worthwhile to Run the Khorne Daemon World list and just take some Chaos Marines as allies. No need for summoning points or sacrificial champions at all.

Back in the day, the demon armies were viewed as overpowered, cultists as underpowered, and the Marines were just right.

Part of that depends on using the psyker rules, which I generally do not. It adds another phase to the game, and also sub-game of shuffling, dealing and playing cards that often results in not much going on - or can destroy the game.

A big aspect of playing 2nd is how you play it. I prefer narrative campaigns where we work out the "big picture" and then come up with not only plausible missions for each side, but incorporate the results into future games. This encourages players to think strategically, and leads to some interesting decisions. Do you fight for the last victory point, or preserve the core of your army for another day?

Simply planting your troops to die fighting may be heroic, but arranging a tactical withdrawal can be much more rewarding. We've had some great games over the years where a picked rearguard buys time for the key elements (leaders, terminators) to get away.

This edition is by far the most narrative-friendly, and if you don't use that, you are missing out.

My suggestion is to build the warband you like, the one that speaks to you, and let the chips fall where they may.

Broken chaos stuff I remember doing in 2nd:
- multiple 3man terminator units to get max autocannons
- a champion of chaos, mark of khorne, terminator armor (+the reroll) + battle-drugs to let him charge across 24" (or 48" with that psy power added on top)
- a nurgle standard bearer with teleporter: port in, trigger the banner, throw a vortex grenade, die
- a champion of slaneesh with terminator armor and blastmaster. I have no idea how I managed to rulelawyer this into existance, but a character with a heavy weapon was broken in 2nd due to their ability to select targets
- always bringing a greater deamon of Khorne to 'upgrade' one of my characters
- a demon engine leman russ battle tank, probably allied in via the cultists (it could ignore the 'crew shaken' results on the damage table, allowing it to keep firing throughout the game unless destroyed)
- cultists also had the ability to bring in other fun imperial weaponry, like various weapon platform, some of which felt broken when placed into a chaos army
- Abaddon always teleporting in and deleting the primary threat with a single attack of his demon sword...
- completely dominate the warp with Ariman (if Eldrad tried to compete, throw a vortex grenade at him)

HMint wrote:

- a champion of slaneesh with terminator armor and blastmaster. I have no idea how I managed to rulelawyer this into existance, but a character with a heavy weapon was broken in 2nd due to their ability to select targets

Yeah, unless this was an Aspiring Champion in a unit, I don't think there was a legal way to do it. It's missing from the Battle Bible, but the Codex restricted Noise Marine weapons to Aspiring Champions.

HMint wrote:
Broken chaos stuff I remember doing in 2nd:

Against a savvy opponent, a lot of these worked against you or were at best a fair trade.

The thing about 2nd ed. in general was that it had a pretty good balance. If you chose to push one aspect of an army, that tended to open up equal and opposite vulnerabilities. Thus: Chaos troops maximized for hth could find themselves chasing around the board without doing much because hth in 2nd was a bit harder to achieve.

Similarly, using a character to boost in a greater demon meant losing all those character points. There was a cost. How it went after that varied.

I would say the best thing about that edition was that the fluff and rules were in very close alignment. If that matters, it will be very enjoyable.

I think my favourite 2nd ed Chaos moment was one of my regular opponents fielding his bright, shiny new Abaddon model with a bodyguard unit of terminators... and I drew the Assassins mission card, and dropped Abaddon right at the start of turn 1 with a Lascannon shot to the head.


Least favourite would be my Eversor Assassin winding up in melee with a squad of Chaos Marines and a Bloodthirster. Thanks to the Eversor getting an extra attack for each successive opponent, by the time I attacked the Bloodthirster I was rather confidently rolling 12 attacks... And rolled nine 1s.

I remember fighting Chaos more than using them in 2nd Ed (even though I had Chaos... the big yellow book was amazing!).

2nd Ed is where my Terminator-clad, Psycannon + Nemesis Greatsword-wielding 4th Level Psyker Ordo Malleus Inquisitor, Dennifus Zentor, made his name. He cleaved his way through so many Khorne Berzerkers it was't funny.

Also where Veteran Sergeant Harklem Oreeater, "The Iron One", "Berzerker's Bane", became famous, fighting off 20 of the things. Seemingly unkillable.

Had a Gretchin called Grumnik the Scorpion Slayer. Guess who he beat in HTH?

 insaniak wrote:
I think my favourite 2nd ed Chaos moment was one of my regular opponents fielding his bright, shiny new Abaddon model with a bodyguard unit of terminators... and I drew the Assassins mission card, and dropped Abaddon right at the start of turn 1 with a Lascannon shot to the head.


Least favourite would be my Eversor Assassin winding up in melee with a squad of Chaos Marines and a Bloodthirster. Thanks to the Eversor getting an extra attack for each successive opponent, by the time I attacked the Bloodthirster I was rather confidently rolling 12 attacks... And rolled nine 1s.

Why opponent allowed that?

You only attack what's in b2b. You didn't have to move to b2b and could continue to sholt.

Eversor charges, touches 2-3, kills them, rest keep on shooting at targets.

Gaming around with unit sizes was one of Chaos strong suits in 2nd. Some other cool stuff I had fun with though:

*Mid tier characters like a mighty champion carrying a daemon weapon to get to around WS8
*Using psychic powers like plague wind for free daemons
*Fishing for psychic powers like the gate or displacement to fling berzerkers into combat very quickly/and to act as a summoning point for more daemons
*Reaper autocannons carrying my army hard
*Having Abaddon's bodyguards carrying lots of flamers, and being able to actually use them after teleporting in. Lots of models running in random directions
*MK1 plasma weapons on everyone who can carry it

 insaniak wrote:
Least favourite would be my Eversor Assassin winding up in melee with a squad of Chaos Marines and a Bloodthirster. Thanks to the Eversor getting an extra attack for each successive opponent, by the time I attacked the Bloodthirster I was rather confidently rolling 12 attacks... And rolled nine 1s.

There is a break point where you've maxed the bonus from extra attacks and rolling more dice simply increases your chance of fumbling. It also takes time to gather up dice, do parries and re-rolls.

In my simplification it's one die, modified accordingly. Yes, you lose the fumble per se, but you can still roll a 1, the other player a 6, and take some lumps even if you have good WS.

Plus it goes much, much faster. Link in sig.

As for hitting Abbadon, he must have been placed with profound clumsiness by the owner, because shots flow front to back through the squad and models screen other models. I don't doubt the guy felt his oats, but it is a nice way to avoid sniping without tons of extra rules.

tneva82 wrote:

Why opponent allowed that?

You only attack what's in b2b. You didn't have to move to b2b and could continue to sholt.

Eversor charges, touches 2-3, kills them, rest keep on shooting at targets.

I mean, it was a while ago, so the details are hazy, but I'm fairly sure it was his turn. He expected to overwhelm the Eversor with numbers. He did, just not quite how we expected.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
As for hitting Abbadon, he must have been placed with profound clumsiness by the owner, because shots flow front to back through the squad and models screen other models. I don't doubt the guy felt his oats, but it is a nice way to avoid sniping without tons of extra rules.

You are allowed to ignore the usual targeting rules in order to shoot at a mission objective. Since the mission was 'The Assassin' we decided that made it legal to target Abaddon directly, even though he was in a squad.

 insaniak wrote:
You are allowed to ignore the usual targeting rules in order to shoot at a mission objective. Since the mission was 'The Assassin' we decided that made it legal to target Abaddon directly, even though he was in a squad.

Ok, that makes sense. Even so, he could have blocked LOS with the actual models. Of course, if you're doing secret draws, he'd not know to do that.

I've done it both ways in the past, but since we like to do narrative gaming, we discuss plausible objectives before the game, generally limiting our surprises to force selection and wargear.

Though this is slightly OT, I decided to repaint my Chaos Terminators. I was looking them over and had a "what was I thinking?" moment. Since the army's basically done at this point (well as done as any army can be), that will be my next project with them.

I don't foresee more CSM stuff per se, but I might add more demons, which have the advantage of being dual-use with fantasy and other sci-fi RPG applications.

I would advise against playing mostly khorne daemons.

Theyre the worst kind of misery to play against. Just pure "none of your rules and stuff matters".

little dinky 3-man squads of Bloodletters that cost 60 points, instantly bottom out any firepower of any significance and then pop back up on a 4+ roll.

Juggernauts that require you to evenly divide hits between rider and rhino the first time you attack them, and then also have a 4+ invuln, so the jugger is nigh invincible turn 1, i.e. the turn you get to shoot them before theyre on top of you.

And just, all of it, 100% all of it, totally invalidates any close combat units your opponent brings. Even supposed "Anti-Daemon Close Combat Specialists" the Harlequins get their asses blasted completely apart by any and all daemons.

 the_scotsman wrote:
I would advise against playing mostly khorne daemons.

Theyre the worst kind of misery to play against. Just pure "none of your rules and stuff matters".

I don't know that they're that tough. I haven't gone all-in on the list (though now I'm thinking about it ) but I think the same kind of fighting withdrawal/movement to avoid engagement that works against the Tyranids would work against them as well.

Maybe it's because I'm on the receiving end, but as a Chaos player, those saves always seem to desert me just when I need them the most.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I remember fighting Chaos more than using them in 2nd Ed (even though I had Chaos... the big yellow book was amazing!).

2nd Ed is where my Terminator-clad, Psycannon + Nemesis Greatsword-wielding 4th Level Psyker Ordo Malleus Inquisitor, Dennifus Zentor, made his name. He cleaved his way through so many Khorne Berzerkers it was't funny.

Also where Veteran Sergeant Harklem Oreeater, "The Iron One", "Berzerker's Bane", became famous, fighting off 20 of the things. Seemingly unkillable.

Had a Gretchin called Grumnik the Scorpion Slayer. Guess who he beat in HTH?

Heh. My 2nd ed lvl 4 Inquisitor was named Euphrateus. He hung out with his counterpart, Tigurius.

Inquisitor powers were so broken though.

Holocaust was amazing.

And that is... not a sentence you want taken out of context.

A couple of months late, but I finally just registered.

A couple more broken things from 2ed Chaos:

Unkillable Scary Rhinos.
Take a rhino, give it Daemonic Possession and Warp Amp. Now, look at the damage table. There are about 2 results that can now kill the thing. They also have Terror, and debuff leadership at -1/-2/-3 within 18/12/6". Just run them up, and watch everything run away. They're about 100pts, so take two (give one a combi-bolter or Searchlight). Movable terrain/cover, scary ramming (not good against Eldar, but not bad against wraithguard), or just Terrific "sit there and win" causers. Watch out for d-cannons. Chuck in a squad of Noise Marines in your army (they're good anyway), and Slaanesh on your Lord/ Icon, so the daemon engines don't vanish. It's seriously worth it. These things are horrifyingly broken.

3-man CSM squads.
You can chuck either 3 plasma guns or 2 heavy bolters in them, and they're worth 99pts. Ie: your army has a tonne of special or heavy weapons that don't give away victory points (and they're especially good at killing Eldar). Think "tactical Devastors, that sometimes blow up". But they deal out a lot of hurt before they do, and never help your opponent win. Look at a SM Tactical or Devastor squad's cost and makeup and options, then look at CSM. Smile. You've got *really* tactical marines, where the tactics work fine. Plasma gun blows up? Who cares, not usually an issue anyway, neither are jammed H.Bolters. You've got more, usually positioned in useful locations. Makes Overwatch even better than normal. Taking 2-3 squads of each is your basic "starter army" in any Chaos list.

Veterans are awesome.
They've got some serious damage output with plasma pistols/guns, and can infiltrate. You could even just infiltrate a couple of autocannons, or give them all powerfists and swords, or whatever. Good at shooting, good at melee, can be anything, and can get you whatever summoning points you want. You can run them cheap in 3-mans, expensive in 5-mans, add an Aspiring Champ, and everything in between. Like, whatever. They're amazingly flexible.

Bloodletters are seriously tough.
4+ ward, with a 4+ regen. A squad of three gives you amazing ablative armour for your Vets, and they only cost 6 summoning points for a squad of 3. That the Vets probably got you, by charging into melee on turn 2.

Swords are redonkulously cheap.
Want to give a model Parry? Well, almost every model in your army gets it for 1pt. This doesn't make you good at melee, but it can make the opposing army bad at it, for little to no cost. If you're not doing 99pt units, everyone gets a sword.

The Army Icon is important.
Those Ld rerolls are great, and you've got some pretty cool icons to boot. The Flesh Banner allows a bit of pre-combat hittyness, so while he's no Jain Zar, there's a lot of stuff that whiffs in melee against him. Mark him and tool him up to taste after that. Honestly, if he's the only character, he is automatically your leader, so if you're running a minmax troops list, he's your guy (although characters are really good in 2nd, so are CSM with plasma guns, so you can swing your list either way). Strategy rating is nice, but you've got the kind of list that doesn't mind going 2nd.

Aspiring Champ snipers.
Aspiring champs, with a plasma gun and a Targeter can be pretty annoying for 40pts. BS6, can shoot anything within 24". Also annoying with a meltagun if they're with Veterans. Not great, but not bad.
(The Blastmaster thing does work with Noise Marines, especially with a Targeter, but the cost of the weapon is more than the cost of the Champ, and he follows normal targeting rules. He can "sort of" snipe though, by placing the blast marker *correctly*, and he'll usually hit exactly where he aims it at. The Scary Chaos Rhinos/ Daemon Engines above really make those break-tests count).

Heroes with Jump-packs/ Warpjump.
You've got really good heroes, but they're all really slow. So yeet them all over the board with a cheap bit of wargear, that's universally available. Seriously, just do it, you'll have fun. Or !fun!. For all the minmax'ing available in the list, sometimes you've just got to do fun crazy stuff, like Chainfist something to death from across the board.
(I'm not saying your Chaos Lord in Termie armour "should" take a Jump-Pack and Combat Drugs, I'm just saying that sometimes, he *MUST!*. It's hilarious. 2nd edition has some really broken funny stuff in it.
Note: Take Allure of Slaanesh as your third pick, for an overcosted character. Let them take that test at -1/-2 with your daemon engine's support. Laugh, a lot. Your Chaos Lord is totally safe in melee, mostly).


That's all off the top of my head for now. Oh, and you can take Ork allies (and a Mek on a Nob-bike with a force field projekta can shut down shooting from an entire section of the board, for a pretty cheap price). Chaos Cultists with Shotguns are also seriously bonkers (read the rules for frag shells, the fact that BS2 isn't necessarily a problem with blast marker weapons, and that they can ruin squad coherency/movement with their knockdown), for 30pts/ 5-man squad. Acolytes with Heavy Bolters and a sword are good for 25pt cheese as well. Not a bad 55pt, Ld 8, 6-weapon squad when combined.

sambojin wrote:

3-man CSM squads.
You can chuck either 3 plasma guns or 2 heavy bolters in them, and they're worth 99pts. Ie: your army has a tonne of special or heavy weapons that don't give away victory points ...

Units worth less than 100 points still award a VP when they are destroyed. They just don't get one for 50% casualties... but with only 3 men in the unit, they're not lasting long anyway.

Still a solid idea for maximising firepower for you, and minimising the opponent’s VP yield.

 insaniak wrote:
They clarified in an FAQ that 'Chaos Armour' is power armour, terminators (aside from Abaddon) don't get the +1.

Although it's worth pointing out that a 2+ armour save for Terminators wouldn't make the model invulnerable thanks to save modifiers.

And beyond that going from a 3+ on 2D6 to a 2+ on 2D6 is not particularly ground breaking to be worth many points.

 insaniak wrote:


Units worth less than 100 points still award a VP when they are destroyed. They just don't get one for 50% casualties... but with only 3 men in the unit, they're not lasting long anyway.

Yeah, but they do actually have to kill all 3. Not that hard, but not as easy as you think, with a heap of S5/7 firepower incoming. Plus, they're really easy to utilise terrain with.

The army leader's +Ld, and the standard bearer's rerolls, are both pretty vital in an army like this. You'll find you end up with a surprising amount of 1-man heavy bolter squads dotted about, or plasma guns, just going "wtf do I do now?". They continue firing, is what they do.

When your basic weapon profile is "waaayyyy better than a bolter", every marine counts.


On the Daemon World 50%+, 25%CSM armies, they're a bit better than you think. Chuck in N'Kari (Ld11, wtf?) or M'kachan (suprise greater daemon! And strategy rating 6+. Vet CSM are an auto-include) and a LOT of pseudo-CSM on Horsies. For when the shooting phase is for chumps. Oh, yeah. You can include some other Daemons too, if you really want. I guess...
(Essentially: "Why, yes. I do play Warhammer as well" The Army.)

((I love GW's 2nd edition version of Daemon Princes. "Look, take a greater daemon, give them 2-3 wargear cards, without any limitations on what they can take. Vehicle card? Yep. Strategy Card? Yep. Just make it up and make it powerful". So much better than 10th's. Back when Daemon Princes were rulers of absolute hell-scapes, more favoured by the gods than any others. They were what Chaos Lords of entire Chapters or Legions aspired to be...))

Also, also. Here's a seriously useful 2nd edition resource:
https://imgur.com/a/DgDqn57
(It's *all-the-cards*, in one place. Download them all!)