so has anyone seen the new CSM codex yet?
Yes, it actually balances a lot in the old codex while bring new things into the fold. While some armies *cough*NURGLE*cough* are now gods amongst men now, other armies that were sub-par (thousand sons, slaaneshi marines) are now capable of doing stuff on the table.
As far as daemon engines go the heldrake is just terrifying. It's only BS3 but vector strike is a big enough threat for any flyer. Forgefiend doesn't impress me at all, but the maulerfiend looks pretty nasty if you can use it right. Defilers are also at 4HP now so that's pretty cool.
HQ-wise I'm definitely glad they added the warpsmith. It only makes sense that the dark mechanicum shows its face. Being able to repair vehicles is definitely awesome.
I didn't read too much about the dark apostle, sorry about that.
Cultists
are not really CAN BE worth the points imo,
unless IF you bring typhus OR KIT THEM OUT AS MELEE CULTISTS. They're guardsmen without the benefits of being guardsmen (ORDERS). When you add in the fact that their armor save is negated by virtually every weapon they will ever face, it pretty much just ruins their entire appeal. What makes them awesome with nurgle is that they can be run as plague zombies, where they have FNP, slow and purposeful, and fearless. If you want to camp an objective those zombies will do it gladly. Melee cultists are capable of stuffting out a ridiculous number of attacks on the charge. 1 attack base plus 1 attack for two CC weapons, and then another for charging adds up to 3 attacks per model in a potentially 35 model squad.
My personal opinion on SHOOTY cultists is if you want a squad of chaos guardsmen, model them with autoguns and run them as an allied IG regiment. Their armor save will be slightly better (5+ as opposed to 6+) and they will be able to take orders, the one thing that makes guard one of the most effective and powerful armies on the table. My recommended build is A typhus army with cultists as plague zombies and an allies contingent of 2 maxed out platoons with conscripts and infantry squads, blob the squads and put a commissar in the blobs. Chaos commissars sound badass anyways to that's all the reason you will ever need.
Something i noticed is that berzerkers now have
5 6 just 4 (THEY HAVE TWO CC WEAPONS BASE) attacks in the first round of close combat. Holy stuff.
Obliterators can now count as shooting with assault cannons so they are definitely worth the points.
Mutilators look silly to me. I sincerely do not get the point. but that may just be me.
Chosen are interesting, but as far as I'm concerned they look like the chaos equivalent to vanguard vets for SM.
Warp talons are hilarious and every chaos player should run at least one squad of them.
Noise marines weapons got major buffs, their weapons are actually effective against MEQs.
Thousand sons armies keep their AP3 bolters and also get ahriman, a ridiculously high-level psyker. They also move normally with the advent of 6e so no more slow and purposeful ruining the movement phase.
I painted a battlesuit
