Warp Talons

Quickly, brothers in Chaos, strike a pose!

Warp Talons are Chaos Raptors with extra Chaos. They look awesome, yet kinda Derp rule-wise. Instead make them count as Chaos Raptors. Remember only to replace their arms with the appropriate equipment.

Fluff

The Warp has overtaken them (but it's a good pain for them) so hard that their capacity for reason or even basic speech is no longer present. They're little more than deranged bat-monsters with an overactive hunting instinct. Their hands and feet have mutated into wickedly sharp talons, at the cost of being unable to use any other weapon, and they are partially daemonic; in fact, they are capable of traveling directly through the Warp, cutting their way through the Veil itself whenever a good battle can be had. They are so bestial that fielding them is supposed to be the equivalent of releasing the dogs of war or the kraken- rather than being given orders, they're shown a picture of what they're supposed to kill or given a possession of the enemy so they can track it by scent. Whenever they're not in flight, they even hang upside down from the ceiling like bats or impotently crawl on all fours, having lost the ability to walk normally.

Crunch

Let's break this down, shall we?

PROS

• Jump Infantry
• Daemons (5++ and Fear)
• Come with two Lightning Claws
• Have a nifty attack when they deep-strike that blinds targets within range, which gives them a modicum of defense

CONS

• Expensive as fuck! They clock in at 30 pts./model; for comparison's sake, Terminators cost a paltry 31 pts./model and can beat the shit out of Warp Talons.
• No assault grenades! This makes charging anything in cover a risky prospect.
• Barring their blind attack, they have no ranged weapons, which makes them vulnerable to gun lines which they may be charging/deep-striking.
• Speaking of that blind attack, it has a criminally short range - 6 fucking inches! You're more likely to scatter onto something and lose your overpriced assault unit or be totally out of range for it to be effective. Even then, blind attacks require an initiative test which isn't likely going to work in a Space Marine metagame.
• Described in the fluff as using their talons to cut through the veil into reality, yet their claw attacks are only AP3. Scrap metal shaped into Ork meganob armor confirmed for being tougher than reality itself.
• They eat up a fast attack slot, which are rightfully designated to Helldrakes, which costs a paltry 10 pts. more than a basic squad of 5 Talons. For the loss, Helldrakes are the single unit in Codex: CSM that makes the fucking book even remotely competitive on account of drakes being moderately deadly!

Conclusion

Just don't! If you want jump infantry, Raptors do what Talons do but for less and arguably better. With the Heldrake nerf (it is however still your only codex flyer), we can once again at least look at our other Fast Attack choices. If you want to run up and charge people, That-Which-Shall-Not-Be-Named are actually faster (somehow), more likely to actually get there, and do more damage to things that aren't MEQ, for the same points cost. However, if you're playing with a more shooty (or at least footsloggy) army, Warp Talons are a fantastic defense against drop pods; enemies that drop in get to shoot, and then they all die to a storm of Lightning Claws that can threaten your entire deployment zone almost trivially, all while hiding behind buildings that hopefully block LoS to the enemy army. Once you've dealt with enemy deep strikers in your backfield, they then have the speed to catch up to your force and contribute further; pretty good for a counter-charge unit/drop pod insurance. But again, if you want to actually charge the enemy straight away, you're better off with Chaos Spawn because WAIT NO OHGODSNOSHHSLNNNNGHNGGGG

Ahem. It's just that they were supposed to be used up close. That whole "tear apart reality and punch them in the face things" was what we wanted, but didn't get! Also, this is 7E Chaos here; if your troops can't shoot back and charge at deep-striking Mary-Sues, what good are they? Your ranged support is going to be tied up in HS slots and when they strike, they will likely have done their goddamn job by shooting at whatever it was that needed shooting in the backfield, often with melta/grav/plas/whatever weapons, meaning they are throwing down for a one-shot suicide attack. Therefore, your backfield guards weren't much of a deterrent.