Night Lords, Realms of Chaos style

Following on from the Realms of Chaos Alpha Legion post, today: I wanted to share with you the Realms of Chaos version of the Night Lords. To put it bluntly (or at least to paraphrase their words), the World Eaters weren't the only chapter to fully dedicate themselves to the blood god Khorne!  Check out the banner and the shoulder pad below it.

Forget dark blue with lightning strikes all over it. These Night Lords are seriously in to the reds and blacks of Khorne! Terrifying!

Horus Heresy Review: Legion Rapier Weapons Battery

The final entry for the elites section is the rapier weapons battery. It is intended to be a semi-automated portable weapons platform. The core concept is that it is able to be deployed where regular tank platforms would not. With a decent toughness and two wounds, the rapier carrier should hang around for a while on the battlefield and is therefore a viable option for the types of terrain its supposed to transverse.

There are only 4 options for the weapons, but each force organisation chart slot may take up to three of these platforms each.  To be honest, I think we'd be wanting to take 3 of the same type if we decided to field these batteries: same range and same purpose makes for a better squadron than a mixed weapon squadron.

The weapons are: quad heavy bolter, laser destroyer array, quad mortar (a.k.a. the Thud Gun!), or a graviton cannon.

The quad heavy bolter is only heavy 4. Although cheap, it is fundamentally still a heavy bolter kind of weapon (i.e. AP5 and nothing particularly special about its effects). This is not my preferred load out as I think infantry can do this almost as well for similar points.

The laser destroyer array is a great tank killer. Taking three of these would cost 165 points and give an excellent possibility of taking out some of the heaviest enemy tanks on the battlefield. Albeit with a 36" range. After that, targeting heavy infantry or primarchs seems like a good secondary idea! The twin-linked and ordnance can really help with this role.

The thud gun is a bit of a classic. With 4 shots and a reasonable chance of pinning (thanks to the "shell shock" special rule), this can really do the hard work against enemy infantry blobs. And the excellent range (up to 60") is nothing to be sneezed at either. I almost prefer this one for sentimentality stakes, but I'd probably still take the laser destroyer array to be honest.

The graviton cannon depends entirely on how you feel about graviton weapons. Rolling a toughness test is a great mechanic that can help bypass regular Strength vs. Toughness rolls. And haywire vs. tanks gives excellent tactical flexibility.

So overall, I really like the laser destroyer, but could certainly opt for the thud gun as well. The other two depends on how you feel about graviton guns or heavy bolters and can therefore be much more situational. I could easily see the graviton cannon getting plenty of use, but less so for the quad heavy bolter.

Horus Heresy Review: Contemptor Dreadnought Talon

The most advanced pattern of dreadnought armour available at the outset of the Heresy, the contemptor features a 5+ invulnerable save due to the atomantic shielding and gains the fleet special rule over its normal dreadnought companion. The weapon load outs are slightly different here as well: plenty more paired weaponry is possible, and, if I'm honest: should be taken full advantage of.

Below are a few sample builds, but in each I concentrate on only a single contemptor. Multiple contemptors can be taken as a single force organisation chart slot and deployed together as a talon but then function as a unit in their own right. Clearly there are some synergies to be had and multiple redundancies.

Contemptor dreadnought, 2 multi-meltas, extra armour (185 points)
A vehicle killer. Plonk inside a drop pod if possible and deep strike near its selected target. The extra armour is to help survive vehicle explosion blasts and other incoming firepower should the need arise.

Contemptor dreadnought, 2 twin linked las cannons (225 points)
Another vehicle killer. Or monstrous creature. Blast away from the back lines.  Good luck!

Contemptor dreadnought, 2 twin linked auto cannons (190 points)
A good deal of withering firepower to build an anti-infantry dreadnought out of.  Probably nicer to take the Kheres cannons (below) instead though.

Contemptor dreadnought, 2 Kheres Pattern assault cannons (205 points)
I regard this one as the de-facto standard build for firepower. Regular dreadnoughts cannot take this option, so one might as well use the advantage of this contemptor option and put it to good use. Heavy 6 rending is really, really significant. Two of them can be devastating. Well worth the points, even on a contemptor with no other upgrades.

Contemptor dreadnought with 2 close combat weapons, each with an inbuilt heavy flamer (195 points)
A classic close combat dreadnought. Replace the heavy flamers for other weapons (plasma blaster, melta gun, graviton gun) to taste. Add on a havoc launcher if you have the points, and place inside a drop pod.

Contemptor dreadnought with 1 heavy conversion beamer, havoc launcher and close combat weapon (225 points)
The conversion beamer and havoc launcher have overlapping ranges (unlike many of the other weapon combinations) and can provide a nice synergy. This guy sits at the back and blasts away - assuming a good line of sight. The close combat weapon is to deal with pesky infiltrators and the like, making for a fully flexible dreadnought role.

The new meta for 7th: Psykers?

When I look back at what I wrote when 6th edition came along, I suggested that the new meta would rotate around flying and flyers. Was that the correct prediction?

In part perhaps. Certainly the advent of flyers such as the Heldrake became defining for a number of Chaos builds. And certainly many marine armies started to feature flyers of their own to a greater or lesser extent.

This had one direct effect on the kinds of armies that I employed: they would either feature flyers of their own, or have multiple ways of dealing with and counteracting flyers. Mark for instance the growth in the number of sky fire squads and fortifications. But I missed out on the sheer growth of deathstar units (but quickly caught on…).

In 7th, I'm going to go out on a (ambiguously sized) limb and suggest that psykers and the psionics phase will come to be the defining feature of the new edition, with unbound armies coming almost in parallel to that (but even perhaps in 2nd place to psionics). Not only will the new system, I think, lead to a huge increase in psykers on the battlefield, but it will also lead to an increase in ways to counter them. Just in the same way that flyers did for 6th. This is not necessarily a bad thing. It just leads to more builds and a different type of arms race. At least in the sense that it is now a very wide open field when it comes to army building. I think we're going to see many armies focusing on psychics, but we're also going to see some other more left-field armies have incredible success as folks build armies on a different meta - perhaps excessive numbers of flyers, infiltrators, jump infantry, drop pod death, fortifications plus defenders or other shenanigans. Being so wide open, its going to see a plethora of builds that will all prove viable one way or another. At least that's my prediction. In so much as the new psychics will open up very specific builds but as armies are constructed around its boons or counter-measures, others will take out the field by some out-of-the-box thinking.

That said, I am concerned as a daemons player. Although I certainly have enough daemonettes, plaguebearers, pink horrors, and bloodletters to summon (and indeed: greater daemons), I worry that a chaos army focussed around summoning extra daemons will be quickly banned in more competitive and casual play.

In the meantime: Vive Le Revolution!

Horus Heresy Review: Legion Dreadnought Talon

A staple of many space marine lists even before the advent of the Contemptor class dreadnought. And with good reason: these guys can be configured in many ways for a variety of roles. To be honest, I'd be a lot more tempted to field contemptors than the regular dreadnoughts since the price increase is very worth while. That said, the regular dreadnoughts are cheaper and have viable builds. Multiple talons of these dreadnoughts will cause headaches and they're fluffy for Iron Hands, Iron Warriors, and so forth.

One key item to remember here is that one can field up to 3 in a single talon. Although they're deployed together, they are then treated as individual units from there on.

Here are a build ideas. I'm only looking at individual dreadnoughts here, but there is clearly room to add in other dreadnoughts (or similar or different builds) to aid the rest of the talon.


Dreadnought, 2 close combat weapons with in build heavy flamers, havoc launcher (160 points)
A classic close combat build with 2 weapons and heavy flamers for taking out large blobs of infantry. Add on a havoc launcher just because its great. Add on a drop pod if you can and go stomping.

Dreadnought, 2 close combat weapons with built in plasma blasters, havoc launcher (180 points)
Getting a bit pricey, but replace the heavy flamers with plasma blasters and then go hunt down some heavier infantry.

Dreadnought, 2 twin linked missile launchers, havoc launcher (165 points)
Plenty of blast templates and potential to hurt light tanks. Sit around and pick your targets to take down. An excellent support build.

Dreadnought, 2 twin linked auto cannons (140 points)
Classic dakka!

Dreadnought, Multi melta, close combat weapon with in built melta gun (140 points)
Place in a drop pod and go tank hunting.

Dreadnought, siege-wrecker with in built heavy flamer, Flamestorm cannon (150 points)
A mixed purposed dreadnought. Crack open a fort and fry the contents. Beef up the armour if you feel you need to with extra armour or armoured ceramite.

Dreadnought, close combat weapon with in built twin linked bolted, plasma cannon (135 points)
Cheap. Cheerful. Effective. And one of my favourite ways to configure multi-purpose dreadnoughts. Several of these will cause headaches.

Horus Heresy Review: Apothecarion Detachment

The competition for the elites slot heats up significantly with the Apothecarion Detachment (unless you're going for a new-style unbound army of course…).

In a nut shell, they're going to give a selection of your units feel no pain. And this also extends to any independent character who also joins the squad. The utility of these to characters like Praetors and legion consuls is obvious.

However, throw in an augury scanner and they're also going to be useful to back line legion heavy support squads as well as more forward squads to prevent infiltration. Of course, regular squad sergeants can also take these scanners, but in a large points battle, having two of them in a squad can be beneficial if the sergeant perishes and the interceptor rule is still needed.

The other options are a bit bland, but could potentially fit in with similarly armed squads. Combi-weapons, volkite chargers and power swords are all viable in some given situations. Artificer armour is however a reasonable to excellent investment if you think that AP3 is going to be an issue (as opposed to AP1 or 2!).

Here's a few builds.

1 Legion Apothecary, Power Sword, Combi-plasma (65 points)
A lot of points for a 1-wound model perhaps. But this one will be joining a front line squad. Perhaps a seeker or destroyer squad.

3 Legion Apothecaries, all with augury scanners (150 points)
All round utility.

2 Legion Apothecaries, both with artificer armour (110 points)
The apothecaries from Forge World are sold in pairs… so there's two here. Artificer armour to help them survive. And therefore also helps their squad survive. An excellent choice really!