Tactics - Thousand Sons

This is the Tactics Page for Thousand Sons fandex

Why Play Thousand Sons

• You absolutely love TS lore and want to play an army of evil space Egyptian sorcerers and undead that aren't Necrons
• You want to utterly dominate Psychic phase.
• You want to rape MEQ armies.
• You're MTG player, and want to set game-breaking magic combos in 40k
• You like to troll people by ruining their plans

Pros

• All your character are psykers, and they are much more effective then most other Psyker in the game with entire page worth of special rules, and another page of upgrades, specifically designed for further altering your psy phase.
• Jetbike psykers. In squads. With in-built meatdustshields.
• Your Psychic powers are generally better than other armies get.
• Everything have an invuln and AP3 bolt weapons. MEQs can eat dirt and die if they find themselves out of cover.
• Your entire army is Fearless.

Cons

• High points cost means you're going to be outnumbered by everything but Grey Knights.
• Eldar with Seer Councils will WRECK YOUR SHIT simply by throwing a nigh-infinite number of Warp Charges into Denying.
• You don't have some of the most broken BRB spells, like Invisibility.
• That pages of special rules, upgrades, and psychic powers are complicated and require a lot of memorization. You're gonna need a sheet of paper to make a lot of notes during the game.
• Invuln and AP3 don't help against things like Guardsmen or Dark Eldar. Cheap hordes are your kryptonite.
• In close combat your guys are worse than regular tactical marines, despite being much more expensive, unless you pump a lot of points into CC upgrades. The fact that equal points of Fire Warriors can actually wipe your golems in melee should tell you everything.
• Your entire army is Feartless. This means no going to ground and no retreats, unless you spend warp charges on it. And you need every fucking one of those charges for something more useful.
• Anti-Psychic units, like Culexus assassins, ML3 Librarians with Adamantium Will or Tyranid Shadow in the Warp will fuck you up.
• Codex: Knights Inductor is your Antithesis as far as fandexes come. Silencers make whatever unit they're attached to immune to psychic powers, and the only way of getting around this is with Pavonis Lightning and Rockfall. In addition, the surge of null charges each KI army will have will make casting any psychic powers difficult unless you're running High Sorcery for classic psykery(At which point you'll be even more vulnerable to leadership debuffs).

Special Rules

• Old Enemies - TS are better against their archenemies at range, but Wolves become much more effective once they come into melee (in which you already suck). Almost everything in the army have this.
• Fleshless - Grant immunity to Biomancy and Pavony powers save primarises (attached sorceres however could be affected), and Living-metal-esque save against stunned and shaken. First one mostly means you cannot buff your golems and dreads with Biomancy/Pavony, but the last one is great for both vehicles and their passengers.
• On the Sorcerer’s Command - the big downside rule. Without the rubric sorcerer nearby your soldiers and vehicles enter the Stupor state in which you basically lose control of their actions. Do note that you don't check for this at the start of your movement phase, like with Tyranid Instinctive Behavior - you basically test for this at the start of each turn. Always keep your sorcerers in the back (or in the middle of the unit, in case enemy have deepstrikers and outflankers), and beware of snipers and barrage weapons, unless you want chunks of your army suddenly turning into expensive paperweights.
• Rubric Golem - Rubric Marine bundle rule, that combines Fearles, SaP, 4++, Fleshless and On the Sorcerer’s Command.
• Golem Driver - Vehicle bundle, much like the previous one, except with 5++ and no SaP so dustdreads can actually run and overwatch.
• Rubric Sorcerer - The third bundle for Sorcerers. Grant Fearless, Psyker, 4++ and the following:
  • High Sorcery - 5E style psychic tests, based on Leadership tests. You only generate random D3 warp charges but this is not a problem with 97% warp-charge effectiveness compared to regular 50% or even Conclave 83%. The real downside is that Leadership-reducing effects (Shadow in the Warp, Mindshock Probe) hits your sorcerers hard and you cannot up chances by throwing in more charges.
  • Innumerations - -1 to all Leadership test results, effectively granting Ld11. This mostly affects psychic tests.
  • Power of Rubric - your know one more power, and deny on 4+ against enemy psykers of equal or lower power.
  • Soul Shield - 4+ save against perils
  • Cults of the Thousand Sons - Each of your sorcerers must pick a cult and generate at lest half of his powers from it, but at the upside it also gets primaris from that cult
  • Sacrifice - Supercharged mode for psychic powers, it consumes a sacrifice token you must buy pre-battle or acquire through special rules, and forces extra dice on Ld test drastically increasing chances of failure and Perils. In return you get empowered version of the spell which most armies cannot deny due to -2 modifier it forces on DtW. Using this rule not always worth it, due to almost 50% chance of fail followed by perils, and on top of that Sacrifice bonuses on many psy powers are only really good in certain situations.
• Soul Hunter - Allows your Sorcerer to generate Sacrifice tokens from his kills.
• Daemon Engine - Same as CSM, but it doesn't come with that once-per game damage booster.
• Rare - Limits units to 1+ per detachment and 0+ in allied one.
• Indirect Effect - witchfires with this effect are denied like they are blessings psyker casts on himself and doesn't count as psy powers, so, for example, they can affect Culexus assassin (as no amount Blankness can protect him from falling rocks).
• Cauterize - FB flaming attacks that ignore FNP and shut down IWND. Most times it is as useless as Soul Blaze, but at least it doesn't throw more tokens on the board. Also, just like Soul Blaze it does not affect Avatar of Khaine, but most things with this rule are ineffective against MCs anyway.

Majick!

Aka the main reason you play this army. All TS sorcs have ascess to Daemonology and SIX of their own discipline. Each must pick one of the five original temples as his own, and roll half of his powers from it, gaining primaris from that discipline.

Minor Psychic Powers

Each Rubric Sorcerer have them. Do note, that Young Sons, Hidden Ones and Magnus are not Rubric Sorcerers. You manifest them without any tests, just by expanding a warp charge. Generally they're quite weak compared to actual psychic powers, and should be avoided unless you absolutely need that effect.

• Obey - Simply cancels Stupor on one of your squads. Mostly used for when you need that leaderless squad to score a point.
• Empower - Here to turn up majick weapon, ammo and icons. Do note that you can only use it once per psy phase, so stacking ctystal weapon and bolts on one unit wouldn't be very smart.
• Enliven - Swaps your golems' SaP for Relentless, which means they can actually run, overwatch, and even sweeping advance if by some miracle they won in a close combat.
• Fall Back - Your escape button when tarpited.
• Halo - Fear. Most things either ignore it or have high enough Ld to reliably pass the test, though it may help to slow down enemy tarpits.
• Illuminate - Psychic searchlight. At least it wouldn't light you up like the conventional one.

Change

Mixed bag discipline. Have some nice utility spells and OK mind-bullets.

• Chaos Storm - Absolutely random witchfire that can range from glorious 7-shot plasma minigun, to laughable S1 AP6. If Lady Luck is on your side (Corvidae may help bribing her), it may be worth it, if not, just keep the power you had rolled.

1. Reality Warp - Causes bullets and bolts aimed at your Sorcerer and his squad to U-turn on to-hit roll of 5 and hit the asshole who fired them. Enemies with low BS would probably just choose to shoot on something else, rather then risk dealing more damage to themselves. Great spell for both busting squad's survivability and potentially killing enemies during their shooting phase. Unfortunately, this have zero effect against blast and templates. Sacrifice allows you to cover multiple units in 6" bubble with this effect.
2. Doombolt - Good old reliable linemaker of doom. Everyone loves it. Sacrifice makes it into railgun linemaker - not much better at killing infantry, but great for blowing up IG parking lot or some multi-wound T5 models.
3. Wormhole - Creates a portal ANYONE can use to jump up to 18" in a blink of an eye. You may and probably should use it in your movement phase, even despite higher warp charge cost. Moving your units exactly where you need them is a godsend, especially for TS, who lose all of their mobility the moment their transport get blown up. A good idea would be to bubble-wrap portal with your models so enemy cannot use it to teleport into your deployment zone or chase you. Sacrifice increases portal range to trolltastic 30" - enjoy popping out behind enemy ADL across the board, and gunning that juicy cover campers down.
4. Dark Blade - Here to murder big things in close combat, and actually quite good at it. Most sorcs in this army don't want to be in CC, but then again you may have no choice. Sacrifice buffs the blade even more, turning +2S into x2S - in case you really want to kill <insername>kingts close and personal.
5. Nether Surge - Very accurate blast, that immobilize vehicles on 3+ and forces initiative test and halves wounds on fail (killing 1-wound models outright) - great against Necrons, Orks or Tau, not so against all kinds of marines or Eldar, and generally good against vehicles that need to move up close. Sacrifice turns in into a big blast and force -1 on enemy I for test, which means you may actually wipe half of a terminator squad with it.
6. Warp Lance - One true anti-tank power. Perfect for blowing up big scary tanks from fairly comfortable distance. Sacrifice cranks it up to eleven, which is a bit of overkill, but then if you absolutely need to blow up that Spartan in one shot - here's your tool for it.

Corvidae

Re-rolls everywhere. This is a discipline you take to support big expensive units. If you want, you can have all of your Sorcerer's roll on Corvidae, and create fluffy Ravens Corvidae Cult

• Guidance - Twin-links everything. This why you go Corvidae to begin with.

1. Foreboding - Here for deterring charges, just like BRB one. Also allows your golems to overwatch on BS3 despite being SaP. Sacrifice version basically grants Tau Supporting fire to the unit, so they can overwatch for other friendlies nearby.
2. Flickering - Rerollable invulns. 4++ with re-rolls is better than 3+ (75% vs 67%, not to mention it works against anything). Sacrifice turns that 4++ into 3++. Rerollable. Try to break though that!
3. Sentence - Malediction that force reroll on saves. Not as useful as you think, due to AP3 everywhere in TS army, but it works on cover and invulnerable saves too. Sacrifice just adds one extra target, nothing special.
4. Perfect Timing - Same as BRB one, Ignores Cover for Sorcerer's squad. As most things in the game don't have 2+ armour or invuln, this basically means no saves allowed. Sacrifice allow to lower enemy invuln, which is very situational.
5. Golden Way - Grant D6+1 re-rolls. While BRB Precognition grants infinite re-rolls for all to-hit, to-wound and to-save, this power is useful for re-rolling something more exotic, like perils result, number of shots for Chaos Storm, run distance, etc.
6. Bend Fate - Contender for the title of the strongest power in the game, this allows you to pick ANY dice after it was rolled and re-rolled and change it's result to whatever you want. D3 times or D6+1 with Sacrifice. Possibilities are endless.

Pyrae

Killing things with fire. Mostly light infantry, though half of the powers are OK against anything up to MEQs. Everything here ignores cover and FNP.

• Fireball - Flamer in a shape of a small blast with a nice comfortable range of 24". For when you need to cook some cover camping GEQs. Sacrifice turns it into a big blast of heavy flamer hits - well worth it against Sv4+ and may be worth the risk against clumped up GEQs.

1. Hellfire - Not as good as BRB Flame Breath against light infantry due to being only S4, but it ignores power armour, so it's OK. Cauterize turns it into Helldrake's Baleflamer. We all love baleflamers.
2. Cracking Blazes - Lowers enemy armour save or vehicle AV. First one is mostly useful on terminator-armoured opponents due to abundance of AP3, but second is a solid gold for vehicle hunting. Sacrifice makes effect permanent, but unfortunately super-heavy walkers you want to use this on are immune to permanent AV reduction.
3. Spontaneous Combustion - Same as BRB, more accurate then Fireball, and with extra charges spent you may snipe models with it, but if it misses or fails to kill the target, you get nothing. Sacrifice gives you a chance to snipe up to two additional models (which subsequently explode), or dump all wounds into one tough target.
4. Fire Wall - Creates a line that burns everything that crosses it like a heavy flamer. It could be used to deter charges, placed behind retreating foes so they would be forced to move through it, or even in front of an enemy unit affected by Pavony Frenzy. On the downside that line also provides 5+ cover for your opponent. Sacrifice turns it into a plasma wall of S7 AP2 - not even terminators would willingly cross that.
5. Molten Beam - Again same as BRB - nice for blowing up tank walls and TEQ's. Unlike anything else Pyrae it does not ignore cover though. Sacrifice doubles the range and quadruples the extra dice for penetration range by replacing melta with armourbane.
6. Crematorium - Turns your sorcerer into a nuke. With a lot of warp charges thrown into it you may cover up to half of a table with S10 AP1 cover ignoring blast that don't even need line of sight. Unfortunately it affects your units too, but at least they have invuln. Bonus points for casting it from flying Daemon Prince so it does not cover your own guys.

Pavonі

Another killy discipline, albeit more well-rounded with useful maledictions, and more suited to killing big scary things rather then hordes of weak mooks.

• Lightning - Not as good at terminator-killing as Bimancy Smite, it more then compensates for that by having Haywire, Concussive, and Blind. Haywire is OK for anti-tank, but you don't have the rate of fire to wreck a vehicle in one turn unless you focus it with multiple lightning-sorcs, concussive would be great against MCs if you manage to actually wound them (5+ for most), and blind is a solid gold against low-initiative armies that aren't orks (who's BS2 to start with) or Tau (who are immune to blind), so basically only 'Crons, though on occasion even Eldar would fail their tests. Do note that if you manage to concuss the solo MC, you would almost certainly blind it too, as blinding test happens at the end of the phase. Sacrifice doubles the dakka, which fixes the problem with vehicle-busting.

1. Agony - 4-shot autocannon, except due to it's "driver wounded" rule it cannot do the job autocannons are supposed to do (taking away their METAL BOXES). Use it to murder anything with a word "warrior" in it's name or to automatically stunlock key vehicles. Sacrifice gives you the choice between doubling the number of shots, or turning it into a krak-missile minigun - this still don't matter shit against vehicles, but against infantry and MCs the difference can be huge.
2. Living Bomb - Much like Spontaneous Combustion except not at all. It still kills one model and then turns it into a blast, but this time it's a Malediction, so it hits automatically can't be Look Out Seer'd and can be used while locked close combat, range is only 12", instead of dealing one wound you must roll more than twice the model's current wounds and remove it with no saves allowed, and blast is only S4 AP- with cover saves and FNP allowed. So it can be used to snipe characters on 3+ and 2-wound ICs on 5+, rather than sniping special and heavy weapons and wiping out chunks out of cover camping squads. Sacrifice version turns wounds test from double to regular, so you can have a chance to explode Calgar or even the Warmaster himself on 5+.
3. Enfeeble - Exactly as BRB one, and thus still awesome. Sacrifice makes this effect permanent, which means that on the next phase you may enfeeble them once more to stack penalties to their Toughness. Dropping Riptide T4 and then instakilling it with a lascannon feels great. Dropping it to T2 and blowing it up with a single bolt pistol shot - even more so.
4. Leech - Very similar to BRB Life Leech, it packs more dakka with lesser strengths, and instead of being able to heal nearby allied models it can overheal the Sorcerer. Sacrifice adds extra two shots, but more importantly it can restore multiple lost wounds (though you still can only have one overhealed wound).
5. Frenzy - Turns any squad within 12" into a madder version of Death Company: they get pretty much all close-combat-oriented buffs in the game, but lose the ability to use their guns as something more than clubs and spears and get old-school Rage where they go completely crazy and charge the closest enemy thing they see. It's obviously good on allies that are about to charge (Rubric golems being Fleshless are immune to it), or on shooty enemies. The later is still risky, as with a combination of Fleet, Rage, Counter-Attack, Hatred and Furious Charge even Fire Warriors could suddenly become badass in close combat, and that closest enemy unit they are about to charge is most likely the sorcerer who casted this power. Casting it from reflecting crystal, sorc dread, flying prince, through the Barrier or better Fire Wall is all valid strategies. Sacrifice basically removes all downsides on both blessing and malediction versions.
6. Battle Form - Iron Arm and Warp Speed with a bit of Endurance rolled together for the ultimate close combat buff. Only +2 compared to Biomancy powers' +3, but it also affects WS (important for duels). Most useful on DP, but even lowly aspiring sorc may kick some serious ass with a statline that can put Mephiston to shame. Sacrifice turns that +2 into +3 (Bolter-immune DP? yes, please!).

Athanaeans

Less killing things, more crowd control. This discipline excels at dicking with low-to-medium LD enemies, no matter how tough or numerous they are.

• Nightmare - -2 Ld malediction with a minor bonus of getting target to fear everything (unless it's Fearless or ATSKNF). As most Athanaeans powers involve enemy Ld in some way this is your psychic equivalent of a Markerlight, used to increase chances for your spells to actually work. Sacrifice takes away Fearless and ATSKNF - good if you plan to assault that target (or it's about to assault you), but most times not worth the risk.

1. Mindwipe - S8 AP2 with 2-4 shots sounds too good, and it is, because it wounds against Ld. Against vehicles it threats anything (including AV 10-11) as AV12, but only deal damage on D3, so don't expect to do anything better than crew stunned, but at leas it would shave off some HPs. The best part is that it can instant death wounded targets on failed Ld test - not as reliable on Wraiths, Dreadkinghts or Greater Daemons (unless you cast Nightmare on them), but Tau and Tyranid MCs with their low Leadership are quite vulnerable to that. Sacrifice adds +1S and increase number of shots, and thus OK.
2. False Command - Not quite the Leash of Slaanesh, but close. On failed 3D6 Leadership test you can move enemy unit during it's movement phase. You can move them out of cover, out of charge/firing range, clump them for some blasts (they can run to spread out or return to cover, but hey, running models cannot shot, so a win-win), just moving heavy weapons and artillery to prevent them from shooting at full BS or at all. Just don't try to pull that on enemy Warlord - he's probably Ld10, and pass that test on normal 2D6, so chances of success are very slim. Sacrifice extends your control to the shooting phase, which mostly means target cannot shoot and run out of the killzone you moved them into.
3. Puppet Master - Use enemies to fire at each other. It's good on vehicles (unless their weapons are hull-mounted) and MCs, not so on infantry, unless you spend one charge to pick the target. Also being witchfire it can miss. Turning that LRBT Battle Cannon against his allies and blowing up nearby Bassilisk squadron with it or taking over Riptide and wiping that Crisis Squad hiding out of your LoS is priceless. Sacrifice version is a bit weird - it makes enemy to hit himself with it's close combat weapon, so it's more about assassinating sergeants and close combat MCs (Independent Characters would just look out seer it).
4. Drowse - Malediction that makes enemy much worse in close combat, and allow anything to charge them without Initiative penalty for not having grenades. Could be much better if you were playing more melee-oriented army. Also as it lowers Initiative it synergise well with Lightning and Nether Surge which both force Initiative tests. Sacrifice nerfs pretty much the same things even further, turning -1 to halving, but also turns off most close-combat oriented rules as well as overwatch - assaulting D-scythe wraithguard and burna-boys is no longer a suicide.
5. Bedlam - Ultimate blob killer. Ork mobs and IG combined squads would murder roughly 1/3 of the models in the squad, which is brutal. Close combat specialist that rely on quality of attacks rather than quantity (Terminators, Incubi, Wraithblades, Lichguard) can lose more than half of the squad, but with their hight Leaderhsip, they can pass that Ld test even on 3D6 with near 50% chance. Sacrifice adds extra D6 to the test to all but guarantee success even against Ld10 - then again you may just safely Nightmare them instead.
6. Paralyze - Very simple but also very strong power, it just shuts the target down for entire turn. To some extent you may do this with cheaper powers, but Paralyze just works without any tests or extra moves. It however, would have harder times to work on really big horde units or Gargantuan Creatures and Super-heavy walkers, and as per new rules Warlord class titan is completely immune to it. Then, why are you playing friendly fandex game against a fagot who fields heavy titans?

Raptora

It have giant "NO" written all over it, even more than Athanaeans. This is what you take to prevent enemy units from... basically doing anything useful. Even powers that do damage are there mostly to slow down enemies tather than killing them.

• Kine Shield - Baby's first Void Shield. So NO, your bolts cannot hurt my infantry. OK, they technically can, but on 6+ and they basically become AP-. Any heavy weapon worth it's salt would probably blow the shield off, but at least it would soak that weapon hit. Sacrifice turns it into a proper AV12 Void Shield.

1. Press - S-1 test or the target is pinned. Even if it's Fearless, MC, Bike or cannot go to ground for some other reasons. It means they cannot move and only fire snap-shots, but get +1 to cover saves, and if you charge them they don't get to overwatch and strike at I1. Combine with Enfeeble or Bend Fate to Press down things with high Strength, like Monstrous Creatures or Crisis suits. Sacrifice forces a re-roll on successful test, so you can press down even S5 with a good chance.
2. Barrier - No, you cannot move there. You cannot even fly there. That wall is absolutely impassible. The most obvious use of it would be to prevent enemy charges and block retreat paths. Also one troll-tastic tactic is to block a flyer with two barriers so it cannot turn neither right nor left and thus is forced to either land (if it have hover mode) or crash, although it requires you having two sorcs with this power. Sacrifice doubles the length of a barrier and allow you to break it in the center and place it more freely.
3. Rockfall - Everyone Dies. OK, not everyone, Probably even no one, because it lacks AP. On the bright side it's a large blast, barrage, have huge range, have strikedown to slow down survivors, and is harder to deny, because adamantium will cannot help you against rocks falling from the sky. Sacrifice grants more strength which is good and AP5 which is almost always won't make any difference.
4. Thief - Extremely short ranged malediction, it allows you to steal enemy weapons and give it to allied models nearby. Any weapons. From a lowly flamer to Drachn'yen. Well you cannot use weapons from Monstrous Creatures and Tyranids (even if you have monster of your own nearby to give it to him), but you can still rip that weapons out of them. Cannot target vehicles, so no ripping out D-strength chainswords from Knights. Sacrifice triples the range to much safer 18". Great power to put on a Sacrificial Scroll if you expect the likes of Abaddon or Lysander, especially if you take a Rubric Swordmaster along to use the stolen weapon. Be warned, however, this may cause the opponent to try throttling you.
5. Long Hands - No, you cannot have Precision/Rending/Bladestorm/Gauss/Tesla guns. No, you cannot jump or thrust move. No, you cannot run. No, you cannot shoot out of hatch or disembark. No, you cannot use your grenades. Because one of them just exploded. No, no, no, no, no. While any of these effects is rather minor and very situational compared to other psy powers, this one have insane versatility in a ways of screwing your opponent.
6. Throw - Psychic Lifta-Dropa. Throw chunks of units out of coherence to shut that unit down until survivors rejoin the squad, crush enemy tanks by trowing other tanks at them! Fun at many levels.

Daemonology

Look here for general demonology tactics.

• Malefic is the discipline you get for it's primaris. You need that daemons to score points, because your own units are too few and expensive to sit on their asses. You'd gonna summon Plaguebearers, because they're excellent at holding that points (albeit very unfluffy for a tzeenchian legion), Horrors, because they're kinda OK at it, but also generate you some warp charges while siting in the back line doing nothing useful, or Seekers/Flesh Hounds for claiming distant objectives, because they're fast. As you press forward summoned units provide distraction targets your opponent have to waste his shooting on, unless he's OK with being charged - at this point you summon bloodletters or daemonettes depending on what they're going to threaten (MEQs or anything else respectively). Possession is pretty much the only power you would not swap for a primaris on your summoning duty aspiring sorc - for very obvious reasons.
• Sanctic is the discipline you get for your death star unit, aiming for Sancuary and Vortex of Doom, because 3++ (probably re-rollable) and Vortex blasts are awesome when you can cast them reliably and quickly move away from. Never swap for a primaris unless you're playing against Daemons, and probably even then it's not always worth it.

Arsenal

Melee Weapons

You can swap your default force weapon for something else or take the second one.

• Force Weapon - Pretty much all of your characters start with it. Sword is for dealing with MEQs, axe is for TEQS, and staff is good for everything else and if you plan to beat faces with Battle Form (by which I mean you don't roll and hope for it, but have it secured in one way or another). You may take the second one of the different type for extra versatility, but only do it if you're gearing for close combat death machine, at which point you'd be better with a staff and Battle Form anyway.
• Hequa Staff - Basically a force halberd. It's free, so take it if you swap pistol for a combi-bolter - otherwise one extra attack is always better.
• Force Dagger - AP2 on initiative, but -1S and it makes you easier to hit in challenge. It's very situational, and most times axe or sword show themselves better. If you desperately need AP2 on initiative it's always better to secure Battle Form or Dark Blade.
• Force Rod - Force Sword that can conserve one warp charge per psy phase to use later. Generally you'd have spare charges only on turn one and maybe two, unless you took a few Malefic sorcs do vent them into summoning daemons. This is more useful in small points games though, where you can gather power for one epic psy-barrage that can win a game, and against armies that often hide large chunks of their armies behind BLoS, like Tau, Craftworlds or Corsairs.
• Daemon Weapon - This is for when you go full on close combat rape train. Extra attacks and strength are cool, and even more so with Battle Form (S9 AP2 daemon mace FTW), but you lose Force and Innumerations.

Ranged Weapons

You start with your standard bolt pistol, and can swap it for:

• Hand Flamer - Only make sense if you're going to assault something, so most times don't bother.
• Combi-bolter - Almost triples damage compared to basic pistol, and allows you to fire from higher range. Complete opposite of a hand flamer it's your weapon of choice for sorcerers that would keep their distance and avoid close combat.
• Combi-weapon - Same as above, but instead of twin-link you get one-use flamer, melta or plasma. You still gonna give that to sorcs speced to shooty disciplines.
• Plasma Pistol - No. Like in every other Imperium or Chaos codex, it's still too expensive for what it does.
• Inferno Promethium - Makes hand flamer and flamer part of combi-flamer AP3, and thus OK.
• Psychoactive Bolts - Here for when you take them on the rest of the squad, and have a bolter rather than pistol.

Amour

Only available to HQ.

• Terminator Armour - Cheaper 2+ armor, it takes away grenades and slows you down, being incompatible with disc.
• Charmed Armour - Better 2+ armour, it's an artificer armour suit with one extra WoP slot on it.

Robes

Robes grant you extra WoP slots and some minor magic utility. Wizard hat not included.

• Robes of Adept - Just one extra WoP slot, nothing special but cheap.
• Robes of Ritualist - For those sorcerers who love to use Sacrifice, this robes make it safer and more reliable, and allow to buy more tokens.
• Robes of Savant - Free minor psy powers. Makes a lot of sense for sorcs whose squads get activateable gear and/or are geared towards close combat.
• Robes of Magister - 3++ and two WoP slots instead of one. Is it worth 30 pts, considering you already have 4++? Unless you go full close combat death machine, the answer is "no".

Books

More magic utility. Yay!

• Book of Knowledge - One extra power to generate. More versatility only for 5 pts.
• Book of Mysteries - One extra power from BRB. Well worth it if combined with Book or Tome WoPs to get one of the most powerful BRB spells you otherwise lack. Alternatively take it for Divination primaris for your Corvidae sorc, and pretend he's a Farseer.
• Book of Dominion - Nice bubble of no Stupor and free Obey once per turn. Great for giving your vehicles bigger leash if you didn't take Tecnomancer.
• Sacrificial scroll One-use item with pre-selected sacrifice-empowered spell that activates automatically (but still require warp-charges). Best used for game-changing spells, like Thief or Bend Fate. It help that you pick that spell during your deployment stage so you can tailor it against opponent's army composition.

Words of Power

Ultimate magic utility section. Robes and/or Charmed armour to have more than one. Because your big hero sorcs like Magister Templi or DP probably would need more than one.

• Scroll - Slightly more reliability in power generation, but you have...
• Book - Being able to secure powers you need is priceless. You're not forced to pre-pick all spells though, so leaving few powers to generate at the start may add a bit of versatility.
• Tome - Ultimate for securing powers, as you pick them at the start of the game, taking exactly what you need against your opponent's army. It's not cheap though, and some other upgrades, like Magister Templi or Book of Magnus drastically lower it's value. Generally not advised on anything lower than ML3.
• Mirror - This is what you take for your Sorcerer Squad to spam powers. Also occasionally could allow you to steal enemy or allied powers.
• Calm - If you expect fighting a lot of Tyranids, take it, otherwise pass.
• Storm - Fucking over enemy psykers in 12" range is fun, but you already have huge Warp Charge pool and DtW on 5+/4+. That being said, it can stop blessings.
• Shield - 3+ Deny for everyone. Cheap, but it's only effective against armies that spam witchfires and maledictions - so mostly Daemons, vanila SM with Conclave and other TS. Not much use against Eldar and GKs, as their most used powers are blessings.
• Sword - -1 to enemy DtW to the minimum of 6+. If you expect psyker-heavy armies, adamantium will or both combined, this is a way to pierce through their strong denies.
• Onslaught - Spam more of the same powers. One of the most expensive WoPs but rightfully so, if you use it on a model with a lot of powers.
• Phoenix - It's free, but unlike other WoPs using it would cost your sorc his precious wounds. It suddenly make more sense if that sorcerer have Leech power to sacrifice his overheal wounds.
• Hawk - If you want to snipe models with Focussed Witchfires without spending extra warp charges, take this.
• Devil/Angel - Reduce perils chance on Daemonology powers from 1/6 to your regular 1/36. Cheap and well worth it if you roll on Daemonology.

Special Issue Wargear

• Sacrificial tokens - You need them for supercharging psi powers.
• Melta-bombs - For blowing up big things made of metal or flesh.
• Jump pack - As usual. Unless you plan to join Sky Rubricator squad, don't bother.
• Sigil of Mastery - Kind of like Mark of Chaos. It grants different boons depending on sorcerer's main discipline:
  • Corvidae - Re-roll saves of 1. Not bad for survivability. DP already have that due to his Daemon of Tzeentch, but then again why do your DP run Corvidae?
  • Pyrae - Flame and melta immunity. Very situational.
  • Pavoni - +1W and poison immunity. Condidering you run Pavony to beat faces, it's a godsend.
  • Athanaeans - Preferred enemy. Nice for spamming witchfires, especially if you're already BS5.
  • Raptora - +1S and cannot be Pinned (if something pinns you through your fearless), concussed or knocked down. Not bad in close combat, but you should probably take other discipline for melee-oriented sorc/DP.
• Disk of Tzeentch - Jetbike (so +1T) with +1A included. Attach your sorc to Discriders or Disc-riding Sorcerer Squad for maximum mobility.

Golem Wargear

Your generalized troops upgrades. Pretty much anything non-character have access to this.

• Frag grenades - It's frag grenades. If you're going for close combat loadout that are not crystal axes, and cannot secure Drowse, this is pretty much mandatory. Otherwise pass.
• Krak grenades - The usual. Might help a bit against vehicles and walkers, and it's cheap, but if you're sure you can keep that squad out of close combat (you have the means, after all), skip this too.
• Bolt pistol As everything stars with a chainsword, this just means +1A. Auto-included for chopy ribricae, not so for shooty.
• Psychoactive bolts - Turns your golems into Sternguard 2.0 for the cost of one Warp Charge. Choices are:
  • +1 BS - only makes sanse against T7 Sv 3+/4+ monsters (basically only DE constructs).
  • +1 S - the mode you would probably pick the most against MEQs, vehicles and monsters that aren't T7.
  • +6" range - self explanatory. If you need a few inches to reach rapid fire this basically gives you +1 shot without downsides. Also 30" single shot mode.
  • Ignore cover AP5 - root out teh cover campers, if they're Sv5+ or worse.
  • Extra shot AP5 - for Deamons, GEQs and Orks out of cover.
• Crystal weapon - Power weapons lite. Two levels worse AP and only +1S Strength on the mace, but you can boost that up with Empower, and then again it's only 2 points per model.
  • -2AP - Proper power weapon, for cutting through saves/
  • +1S - Extra strength for dealing with vehicles and MCs that does not fit your power weapon mode profile. Also good for mulching down GEQs if you get a lot of attacks (discriders on the charge). Maces get +2S for a total of 7 - great for busting open vehicles, not so against anything else because of AP of only 6.
  • +1A - For mulching down GEQs if you don't have a lot of attacks
• Combi-weapon - it's not listed in this section, but pretty much all rubricae squads get access to it. For the squad that is supposed to move into rapid fire range it's always a valid choice, but not so for those that are going to sit behind and fire single shot mode while their sorcs lob long-ranged witchfires or buff everything around them with blessings.
• Chaos Icon - Teleport homer for termies and daemons, except it need to be activated beforehand. Summoned/allied daemons and daemon marine allies would be grateful for guidance.

Vehicle Wargear

Unlike CSM, you can only take one pintle-mounted weapon.

• Combi-bolter - 4+ save against weapon Destroyed on your Vindicator. On anything else you'd be better with other pintle-mount.
• Combi-weapon - Not bad on vehicles you expect to press forward, so mostly Rhinos.
• Havoc launcher - The pintle-mount you want on anything mech save Vindicators and Rhinos. Because aside from it and Pyromancy you have little other ways of dealing with light infantry.
• Reflecting Crystal - If you're playing WarmaHordes, you instantly recognize this as an Arc Node. If you don't, please stop reading this and go check WarmaHordes. Crystal isn't cheap, but it allows you to extend your sorcerer's reach and simultaneously frees that vehicle from the Sorcerer's Command leash without dropping it's BS.
  
  
• Searchlight - As usual. If you have a few spare points after flashing out your army, here's where you can dump them.
• Dozer blade - You know what it is.
• Extra armour - You already have 4+ save against crew stunned, but if you insist...
• Daemonic Possession - Your possessed transports don't eat their passengers unlike CSM ones, and have better save against stuns at the cost of BS3, but the main reason you would take this is freeing the vehicle from the Sorcerer's Command leash.
• Parasitic Possession - Comeback from the glory days of 3E, it allows your vehicle to repair itself by killing stuff.
• Scrolls of Detention - Upgrade for a possessed vehicle, which removes BS penalty and doubles the chance of self-repair on Parasitic Possession.

Reliquary

Your artifacts. Unlike most other armies you buy this on top of your other gear, without givin up your force weapon or pistol.

• The Book of Lorgar - Daemon summoning/banishing 101 manual written by Lorgar. 4 powers you can pick from Sanctic and Malefic are quite handy if you're hunting for Sanctuary and Vortex, but for some reason don't want to take Book WoP. The big cheese of this piece of wargear is the fact once per game it allows daemons to charge out of deepstrike/summon the turn they come on the board. Any daemons. This includes Mutilators, allied Greater Daemons, deep striking daemon vehicles or even the rape machines that Daemon Lords are.
• Soul Mirror - One use telepathic thingie that allow you to completely screw one enemy character and his squad within 18", and even more so if he's a Psyker, or a Warlord (or both). Free psy powers are cool, and army-wide Interceptor could be extremely powerful against reserve-heavy lists.
• Dreambreaker pistol - 30 pts for a bolt pistol that aren't even AP3? Well, it permanently drops enemy Leadership on hit, and if you kept your original pistol you can fire both. Nice thing to add to your Athaeneans Magister Templi.
• Insatiable - Force staff without Concussive, that shoots nice infantry-eating blasts, and can generate you extra mastery levels for killing enemy characters. Sorc with a focus on killy spells can quickly go out of control with this thing.
• Obsidian Casket - Dead xeno psyker in a little coffin can store your unused warp charges like a super Force Rod, and allow you to double-tap your powers much like Onslaught WoP. Add an Onslaught, and you can vomit out 4 of the same powers out of a single dude.
• The Book of Magnus - 6 extra powers to pick (one from each discipline) and re-rolls on psychic tests. Add this to your disc-riding mirror-sorcerer squad deathstar for maximum versatility.
• Doom Spear - +1S AP2 weapon on initiative, AND it could be thrown, ignoring cover and sniping models on 4+. This is the only ranged AP2 Force weapon in the game, which means ranged Instant Death even for 2+ models. Give this to a winged Prince to blow Tyrants and Bloodthirsters out of the sky and hunt down Riptides or Dreadknights. Also could be used for assassinating enemy special characters IF you combine it with a Bend Fate to pierce through their 2+ Look Out Sir rolls. That being said, it's ridiculously expensive.

Unit Analysis

HQ

• Sorcerer - Your bread and butter standard sorc. Not much better than aspiring one you get as a part of any squad with only one extra wound and better WS (which mostly wouldn't come into play), but he can and probably should take additional mastery levels up to level 3, and have access relics and special issue wargear. They are the cheapest of your spellslinging HQs and much more cost-effective than the others in terms of getting Warp Charges, AND you can take up to three of them in one slot. If you're planning to specialize in maledictions, blessings and summonings this is the best choice.

• Sorcerer Lord - Bigger and scarier sorc, he comes with ML2 and a statline of Chaos Lord (-1 WS). Can be upgraded to a whooping ML4, and have a unique upgrade "Magister Templi" which grants him all the powers from his own discipline and re-rolls for psy tests for that discipline spells. Being BS5 he's better at trowing out witchfires, especially those single-shot ones, and with a higher Initiative he wouldn't die in a challenge against enemy combat HQs before his own initiative step.

• Daemon Prince - Monstrous sorc that runs (or more often flies) solo. Much like Sorc Lord it can go up to ML4 and excels at throwing out psychic dakka with his BS5. If When you give him wings he would be the only model in your army that can mindbullet enemy flyers and FMCs. As he comes with a Soul Hunter standard and is quite good at killing stuff, giving him robes of Ritualist for reliable Sacrifice casting is almost a must. This is the most expensive of your sorcerers, and not much better at casting most spells, so if you don't plan to use him as close combat rape machine, complete with Daemon Maul and Battle Form and probably Iron Arm too, or as a psychic interceptor, take normal sorc or lord instead.
  • Kai Gun - Another comeback from the glory days of old, its a decent gun against infantry, light vehicles and monsters, and it can help you generating extra sacrifice tokens.
  • Screamer Cloud' - Grants you three T5 W1 invisible bodies to Look Out Seer for against enemy shooting. As DP is not an independent character he only LoS on 4+ - it's basically an additional 4++ save rolled before your regular one. One thing to note, is if you're planning to secure Battle Form and/or Iron Arm, those invisible models would bring down your majority toughness back to 5 until only one of them is left - thankfully you can choose to not regenerate them after losing.

• Tecnomancer - Specialized mech-supporting sorc. First off, it provides an awesome 24" bubble of no stupor for your vehicles, so you don't have to keep close to your other sorcs or spend extra points on possession or crystals. Secondly, his special psy powers are great for supporting mech, repairing them, increasing their firepower and granting anti-assault protection/deadly tank shock. The icing on the top is his Possess Vehicle that allow you to ressurrect vehicles from their wrecks (and wrecks only, so no possessed Knights or Titans, as they always explode), applying both Korona and Burning Wrath to them and increasing their BS to Tecnomancers 5. This includes enemy vehicle wrecks as well. Even with a ton of drawbacks it comes with possession is incredibly powerful, especially when resurrecting something with a lot of dakka, like Land Raiders, Mortis Dreads or even Battlewagons full of rokkits (because they're S9 BS5 now). Being Pyrae, Tecnomancer can also throw out fireballs, just in case you need some extra anti-infantry. And finally, it allows you to take one Infernus Relic vehicle from Chaos IA. Which means Fire Raptor or Sicarian in case you don't have Raptor. Overall, a great HQ if you go heavy mech and OK even if you only have a few highly shooty vehicles.

• Insorcist - Infantry support to Tecnomancer's vehicle support. Same 24" bubble of no stupor, but for non-vehicles, and a set of supporting psy powers, that focus on keeping your golems alive undead and bringing back those who died. His iconic shooting power Vengeful Spirits becomes more and more powerful as your casualties grow, although your opponent would try to focus him down before you start throwing out double-digit numbers of poisoned cover-ignoring AP2 shots. Additionally, being Corvidae he can boost his troops damage output with Giudance or even roll a Flickering for making his golems nigh-unkillable with three successive 4+ saves.

• Rubric Swordmaster - Your only non-psyker HQ, it focuses on one thing and one thing only: killing things in close combat. Swordmaster cannot reach the heights of melee rape Sorc Lord or DP could with a Battle Form, but it's much cheaper and very killy for it's cost, and for just one Warp Charge he becomes AP2 3++ (in addition to being able to Sweep). Unfortunately, you cannot mount him on a disk, so to get the most out of him he needs a transport.

Special Characters

• Ahzek Ahriman - Your shooty super-sorcerer, Ahriman is a maxed-out sorcerer-lord, geared towards dishing out insane amounts of witchfires (as long as you have enough warp charges) - his staff allows him to triple-tap one witchfire, and he can pre-pick the ones he generate normally AND pick one from each discipline during deployment, so you're guaranteed to have exactly the powers you need against your opponent's army. Being Corvidae he's forced to pick at least 3 of his powers from it, although it's not much of a drawback, as Corvidae powers are quite useful for boosting his and his units firepower and survivability. His WoPs also allow him to pierce powerful denies and ignore Shadow in the Warp. If you choose a Dark Blade and/or Battle Form he also could be a close combat monster, but since he cannot shoot while locked in combat it's not recommended to actively try and search close combat.
  • Alter Fate - Global power that can force re-rolls on any one die once per each PHASE. Including enemy rolls as well. Well worth its warp charge cost. Do note that you can re-roll reserve rolls (well, one reserve roll), with this as well, since they happen during movement phase and it stacks well with Ahzek's warlord Trait that allows you to outflank few units. And as your opponent tries to bring his reserves you may try to delay one particularly nasty unit for a turn or two, which may win you a game.
  • The Rubric - Plain and simple spell for killing psykers - almost guaranteed to kill the likes of Librarian, and deal a lot of damage to tougher models like Greater Daemons or Tyrants. It may however backfire horribly with a warp surge granting 3++ to the surviving target.

• Hathor Maat - Your choppy super-sorcerer, Maat is much like a TS version of Mephiston, except with better psy powers and worse armour. As a Magister Templi he knows all Pavoni powers and re-roll psy-tests to manifest them, and if you make him your warlord he would re-roll all other powers too, which may come in handy since he can use his wounds (which he have FOUR of) to fuel Sarifice spells and then regenerate them with his staff and/or Leech. Ability to cast TWO Battle Forms on his already impressive stat line, combined with 3++ and +2S staff means he can become WS10 S10 T9 I10 A8 titan-wrestling monster wherever he needs. With the ability to double-tap any of his powers he's fairly shooty too, especially against vehicles, as Lightning and his own unique spell "Thunderstorm" chew through hull points in no time, and double Agony can stunlock two vehicles outside his "no mech allowed" radius of 24". The problem is he's slow, and while in a Land Raider he cannot cast his powers unless you link him to a crystal. Ideal solution would be to secure a Wormhole for one of your other sorcerers so Maat could jump into the middle of the field and start wrecking havoc - you may even run him solo if you're OK with spending 2-4 warp charges on defensive Battle Forms, just make sure he stars the game in a unit in case of across-the-board sniping or loyalist marines drop-poding in front of him and gunning him down before he can buff himself.

• Magnus The Red - He's Daemon Primarch, so obviously he's a rape machine, and he costs almost as much as a Titan. Magnus is a Mastery Level SIX psyker who knows all TS powers save Tecnomancer/Insorcist specific ones, and he passes all psy tests automatically, including sacrifice ones and he can use warp charges as Sacrifice tokens, and denies against him are made with -1 penalty without that "minimum of 6+" of the Sword WoP, so most regular units cannot deny against him at all. His Metamorph special rule basically makes him a Gargantuan Creature for the purpose of survivability. His armour save is 2+, although he loses it after dropping to three or less wounds, his eye have a statline of Helldrake's baleflamer with an extra rape against psykers, and his close combat weapon is a simple force ax with which he can strike on initiative because he's a Monstrous Creature. He can even fly, temporarily sacrificing two mastery levels for it. And on top of that he provides a 24" bubble of no stupor for EVERYTHING. The only thing that stops me from calling him uber-daemon prince is his special rule that increase the cost of all blessings he uses on himself, so he's not quite as good at buffing himself to a stratosphere and wiping entire units in glorious close combat - he's more of a guy to witchfire/maledict enemies to death, especially if he can draw some extra warp charges from other sorcerers.
  • Much like Warhound titan, unbuffed Magnus is a glass cannon with insane firepower on a relatively squishy (for his point cost) body. You may alleviate this problem by buffing his survivability with blessings and/or wings, but at the expense of his firepower, to the pont that you can turn him unto invulnerable brick with no firepower aside his eye.

Troops

• Rubric Marines - Your basic bread and butter scoring units. Slightly cheaper than ones in CSM codex, and with much better aspiring sorc, but with all the downsides of stupor. You must take at least one if you want to remain battleforged, but you'd probably take them anyway, just for securing objectives. They are great at fighting Sv 4+/3+ enemies, especially if they are armed with some powerful guns, but suck socks against cheap mooks, be it hordes of MSUs. Never ever take them without a trusty Rhino, unless you want to spend your precious warp charges to just run them where they need to be.

• Young Sons - Your not-scouts, who cannot infiltrate or hide in cover with cloaks, but have AP3 bolters and are psykers. You take them to hold back-line objectives and generate warp charges for your actually good psykers. They are very cost-effective for the second purpose (not to the point of Warlocks and Pink Horrors, though), but casting powers from them should be avoided if possible, since they have none of the sexy psychic rules other sorcerers get. For the same points cost they deliver twice as many bolter shots as Rubric Marines, but they are much frailer and are NOT fearless, while still being relatively expensive.

Dedicated Transport

• Rhino - Your good old Metal Box, now with an awesome 5++ and meh AP3 bolters for a minor points bump. Everything that can buy it should. Period. Even backline point-holding squads. Havoc launcher is all but auto-include too, even if you don't use it for a first two turns, pressing forward at flat-out speed. Due to Stupor it cannot be used for tank shocking distant enemy squads and contesting objectives once it delivers it's the passengers, unless you took a Technomancer. In which case set it on fire with Corona and run it through as many light infantry squads as you can - it's about your only way of effectively dealing with MSU Guad.

Elites

• Rubric Terminators - Like the regular Chaos Termies, but with more (and better) guns, no fists, sorcerer characters (yes, in plural), and Drop Pod-grade safe Deep Strikes. So yeah, definitely a termicide, rather than melee beatstick - drop those guys loaded with combi-weapon and heavy guns on priority target and watch it going boom, and now there's giant distraction in the middle of your opponent's forces, that would eat entire phase worth of firepower and maybe a charge to let the rest of your army move into position.

• Sorcerer Squad - The glassiest of glass cannons, these guys are your death-star. Entire unit of aspiring sorcerers on discount, that could take extra golems for ablative wounds. Entire squad should be mounted on disks for the JSJ potential that would put Tau to shame - as your primary "shooting" happens during psy phase the squad is free to flat out (up to 24"!) after unloading their mind bullets to hide behind some solid BLoS - just hope your opponent wouldn't catch them with deep strikers, flyers and jump packs. While T5 and 3+/4++ may seem tanky, stupidly high points cost for a 1-wound models means they're actually extremely fragile. As mentioned above, equipping the entire squad with Mirror WoPs is very good on spamming multiple same powers. Make sure to model each sorcerer in a squad distinct from the others or at least mark their bases, as because each one of them have his own set of powers.

• Terrorfiend - 4 flashbane AP2 shots are kinda OK at hunting MCs and even GCs (now then they're only resistant to poison and sniper, not the fleshbane), but with 1.66 wounds per turn before cover, invuln and FNP, Terrorfiend is not going to make actual kills against multi-wound models. And you want it to kill things, because it powers up a nearby sorc with a free safe and reliable sacrifice token.

• Rubric Dreadnought - More like a loyalist dread, it's a reliable fire support platform, a source of occasional vehicle/building bashing and counter-charges to save your shooty squads. Not as good at dropping at the enemy in a pod, since your pod is more expensive than the one loyalists have, the dread itself is more expensive, and you'd gonna need to pump more points into it to prevent Stupor, so it kinda defeats the point of cheap surgical drop. It works best with your home objective holders, as it won't keep up with Rhinos.

• Sorcerer Dreadnought - Psychic dread. Like the one BAs get, but better, because 4++, all the TS psi-rules, better powers, WoPs (which it can get up to three of) and potential for ML2. If you thought flying dread that shoots mind-bullets in addition to regular ones was bad watch out for wormholing dread that brings squads of infantry with him.

Building an Army

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Tactics

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Counter-Tactics

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Common Playstyles

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