Warhammer/Tactics/6th Edition/Chaos

Why play Chaos

To crush your enemies; to see them driven before you; to hear the lamentations of their women.

The forces of Chaos - divided into two army books, Hordes of Chaos and Beasts of Chaos, but written to work as a pair - are savage, brutal, unforgiving barbarians, plus twisted-up gnarly mutants and eldritch monsters from another dimension. It is an army raised for a single purpose: to destroy the world of men (and elves, and dwarfs, and even goblins and especially lizards, although rodents of unusual size may be all right).

In battle, the Chaos army is a relentless melee death machine, forsaking any ranged attack that isn't "throw a melee weapon at someone" or "bind an eldritch horror into a cannon the size of a house and fire it when you want to move castles out of the way". Some Chaos armies opt for weight of numbers, drowning the foe in a sea of low-cost light infantry; others go for the small force of elite hard-cases wrapped in nigh-impenetrable armour. Chaos has access to powerful, aggressive magic to ease their passage across the field, and a wide variety of fast-moving "chaff" units to distract and harry the enemy, but make no mistake: sooner or later, this army is about bringing axe to face and making damn sure it stays there.

Army Special Rules

Daemons, Mortals and Beasts

Most Chaos units are classified as either Daemons, Mortals or Beasts. If your General is a Mortal, Mortal units are your Core units, while Daemons and Beasts are Special. If your General is a Beast, Beast units are your Core units, while Mortals and Daemons are Special. If your General is a Daemon... you get the idea. Just to complicate things further, some units (mostly Rare, but one or two Specials like Chaos Trolls and Chaos Ogres) always stay in the same category no matter who's in charge.

Marks of Chaos

Many Chaos units and characters have Marks of Chaos. The default is the Mark of Chaos Undivided: all units which can have a Mark start off with this one, and it's free. You can choose to dedicate your units to a particular Chaos God and gain upgrades, for a few (or more than a few) extra points. The Marks do different things depending on the model they're applied to, and we'll get into the specifics of those later.

The important thing for the army as a whole is that if your General has a particular God's Mark, all your troops who can have a Mark must have the same one, or stick with Chaos Undivided. If your General has the Mark of Chaos Undivided, you can go hog wild with the rest of your units and characters and take what you like.

Also, characters with a Mark can't join units with a different one, although they can join units with no Mark at all (which is how you get characters into Beast Herds, Marauders and other troops that don't have the option).

Daemonic

Some Chaos units are not of this world. Daemon units all cause fear, and the big 'uns cause terror as well; they are immune to psychology; they have a 5+ Ward save which applies to everything except magical attacks; they count as having magical attacks themselves; and they have Instability.

Instability is a fiddly rule that comes into play if your Daemon unit loses a round of combat. Once you know they've lost, take a Leadership test on their unmodified Leadership stat: if they fail this, they disappear, vanish into the Realm of Chaos in a huff. THEN take the same roll and compare it to their Leadership stat as modified by combat resolution, and inflict that many unsaveable wounds on the unit.

Oh, and Daemon characters can't join non-Daemon units, or vice versa.

Ambush

If your General is a Beast with the Ambush rule, Beast units with the Ambush rule can move on from a table edge instead of deploying normally. You can Ambush in any battle where you're allowed to use Scouts. Up to half the eligible units in your army (rounding down) can Ambush, and your General has to start the game on the board. Units in Ambush aren't in play and don't generate Power or Dispel dice, so keep your wizards on the table.

Starting from the second turn, in the Remaining Moves phase, you can bring your Ambushing units on. They have to come on all at once. For each unit, one by one, pick a point on any table edge: that's where they should be. Then take a Leadership test for the unit. If you pass, they move on from that point as if they've returned from pursuing an enemy off the board. If you fail, roll a Scatter die in the middle of the board and follow the arrow to the edge: that's where they turn up instead. (Don't forget that there's a little arrow on the HIT faces for exactly this kind of situation.)

Marks of Chaos

Who Gets 'Em?

• Daemons - Daemon Princes and Exalted Daemons
• Mortals - Lords and Sorcerer Lords; Champion and Sorcerer Heroes, Warriors, Chariots and Knights
• Beasts - Beastlords, Great Shamans, Doombulls and Dragon Ogre Shaggoth Champions; Chieftains and Shamans; 1 and only 1 Bestigor unit; Minotaurs

Mark of Chaos Undivided

The default option, totally free, and not to be sneezed at, this Mark offers a reroll on all psychology tests (that's fear, terror, panic, controlling your frenzy, but NOT Break tests for losing combat). Chaos armies have pretty average Leadership on the whole, with Warrior units a bit better and Beast units generally worse. They also tend to take quite a few Panic tests as the first few turns are a slog across the battlefield getting shot at on your way into melee. While other Marks allow you to dominate whole phases of the game, they get expensive fast, and if you want a proper ravening horde, sticking to Chaos Undivided is a good option.

Mark of Khorne

This one's the same all the way down: anything with the Mark of Khorne gets frenzy (even if normally immune to psychology) and puts another Dispel die on the table.

The frenzy is a double edged sword. Certainly, Chaos units hit like a sack of bricks anyway, and giving them extra attacks is only good. Absolutely, Chaos units tend to take casualties, and thus panic tests, and so bypassing those tests is only good. However, Chaos armies tend toward the clumsy, which means agile opponents can block, bait, and misdirect Khorne armies all day long. There's nothing worse than some Wood Elf player leading you around by the nose and forcing you to attempt charges that never land.

On the other hand, there's nothing better than laughing in the face of every Vampire Counts or Tomb Kings player you meet as their chief advantages simply fade away in the face of your enhanced combat prowess, complete lack of concern for fear and terror, and pile of Dispel dice to keep those cheeky Invocations under control. Couple with the access to Magic Resistance on many Khorne Daemons and magic items, and you're laughing.

This one's particularly good for Beast armies: Bestigor and Minotaurs are both units that delight in the extra attacks, and the rest of your army can run interference by blocking your charge lanes. Remember that frenzy is only checked AFTER charges have been declared, which means you can keep these under control with the proper order of activation (declare charge with skirmish screen, declare charge with frenzied unit, check for eligible frenzied charges - oh no, skirmish screen's in the way - then move chargers in order of declaration, hey presto you get to charge what you want to as the lane is now clear). Both Warhounds and Beast Herds are very good at getting out of the way when they need to.

Another thing to consider here: Chosen. Because of the extra attack from frenzy, Chosen Warriors with halberds suddenly become a more attractive proposition, throwing out a combine harvester's worth of S5 attacks at anything that gets near them.

Mark of Slaanesh

Daemons and Shaggoths with the Mark of Slaanesh always strike first. Mortals and Beasts with the Mark of Slaanesh are immune to psychology.

This. Is. Brilliant. Warrior and Bestigor units often balk in the face of shooting casualties or being outnumbered by fear-causing enemies: not a problem any more. Even Minotaurs like to laugh off the prospect of being terror-blocked by a Wraith or similar, and tend to come in small and easily panicked units of their own.

Mortal characters gain access to the excellent Mount of Slaanesh, a pleasing combination of speed and power that's halfway between the Juggernaut and the Disc. Beast characters don't, sadly, but the Beastlord can at least mount up on a Chariot and become a fearless guided missile, backing up your Herds if they get into trouble.

Daemon characters are a bit squashy, lacking access to armour saves, so striking first in close combat helps them not get hit (and since they fly, they really should be in close combat very early on in the game). The Shaggoth, meanwhile, is moderately well armoured but has dodgy Initiative for a Lord choice: guess what, striking first, problem solved.

Mark of Tzeentch

For reasons that will become apparent as we go on, there is no such thing as a Sorcerer or Shaman of Tzeentch: this Mark is not available to those models.

Daemon Princes, Chaos Lords and Beastlords all become level 4 wizards, who have to use the Lore of Tzeentch. (It's heckin' expensive, at 140-150 points.)

Exalted Daemons, Chaos Champions, Wargors, Shaggoths and Doombulls all become level 2 wizards, who have to use the Lore of Tzeentch. (It's still pretty pricey, at around 75 for most models.)

Mortal characters also gain access to the Disc of Tzeentch, a cheap flying monstrous mount that can't fight worth a damn but doesn't need to because there's a goddamned Chaos Lord standing on its back doing the heavy lifting.

Everyone else generates an extra Power die for the pool, as long as they're not fleeing.

Now. It's easy to look at this and think you have to go big or go home. For Mortal players in particular it's easy to look at the Mark of Tzeentch and think you MUST TAKE IT ON EVERYTHING EVER, UTTERLY DOMELNATING THE MAGIC PHASE, but - stop. For one thing, it's seriously expensive, and yes a Chaos Lord's statline and a Sorcerer Lord's casting power are not to be sneezed at, but the points add up fast and Chaos armies already run expensive. For another, a pure Marked Tzeentch army may have a lot of Power dice to throw around, but it'll be light on numbers (as none of the cheap bodies can carry the Mark) and crumple to a run of bad terror or panic tests (which you'll be taking a lot if you've loaded up on small Marked units to spam dice).

Far better to have Tzeentch casters backed up by Undivided units (which remain an option even if your General has the Mark of Tzeentch), or even elements in a mixed army with Khorne or Slaanesh line troops. That's an army that won't break and run when things start to go south, but will still deliver the fighting power of a good Tzeentch Champion alongside options for other Lores and tactics.

If you're going to go pure Tzeentch, Chariots are a really good way to sneak a few extra power dice into your army, make sure all your wizards have enough to cast at their full potential, and then fill out on solid Undivided bodies or Marauders to give your casters the meatshields they need to get the job done.

It's less of an attractive option for Beastmen, as well. Beast armies don't have the ability to load up on cheap Marked units and really stack the dice in their favour, and they feel the Panic hit worse than most. Their best Lord options don't become level 4 wizards because even Gav Thorpe thought that was a bit excessive.

Mark of Nurgle

Daemon Princes, Exalted Daemons, Doombulls and Shaggoths get +1 Wound.

Beastlords, Wargors and Mortal characters get +1 Wound and cause fear.

Units cause fear, except Minotaurs, who get... 5+ Scaly Skin? (It's cheap, and it's not bad, but it smacks a little bit of being fresh out of ideas...)

The Mark of Nurgle is generally very, very expensive for what it does: 50 points per unit, around 40 for a character. The extra Wound is nice, but fear is of limited use on units that tend to skew small - the Chaos units that can afford to go big are exactly the ones you can't Mark anyway. Chaos tends to win combat by getting kills rather than auto-breaking shenanigans, and while it's certainly nice to trump stubborn units or not run away from Undead, it's... situational.

Chaos Spells

Wizards with the Mark of Chaos Undivided get access to Death and Shadow magic, plus Fire (Mortals and Daemons) or Beasts (Beasts). Shadow magic is probably the pick of the pack here, with Unseen Lurker and Steed of Shadows to accelerate your movement into combat. Fire does a fine job of compensating for your lack of conventional ranged firepower, and the Flaming Sword of Rhuin is a great spell to draw on your Daemon Prince or Exalted Daemon. Death is merely OK, and Beasts highly situational with a few too many spells that rely on your opponent having brought the right models to cast them on.

Lore of Tzeentch

Tzeentch spells are all about doing damage, or preventing damage - oddly enough, the real moustache-twirling nyahahahahajustasplanned stuff is more Slaanesh's remit. Notably, this lore has seven spells: any wizard can trade out a spell they don't want for Red Fire of Alteration, which you can't roll up at random because you can't roll a 0 on 1d6. (Note that because of the way 1d4chan's code handles numbered lists, it's at 7 on our summary, which of course breaks the rainbow theme GW were going for.)

1. Orange Fire of Protection - cast on a 6+, remains in play, reroll any of the Sorcerer's to hit, to wound or to save rolls that you don't like. (Just the Sorcerer: not anything they're riding.) Actually pretty good: an easy cast, and Tzeentch Lords or Heroes can throw down in combat with the best of them.
2. Yellow Fire of Transmutation - another 6+ cast that remains in play, this one granting a 5+ Ward save to the Sorcerer, their mount, and any unit they joined. Notably, this one replaces the Daemonic Ward, allowing Tzeentch Daemon characters to stop worrying about magic weapons.
3. Green Fire of Mutation - a 9+ cast on an enemy unit that's not immune to psychology, which makes it play "stop hitting itself" for a turn: the unit fights a round of close combat against itself and takes a Panic test if enough casualties are inflicted. Some armies hate this - Lizardmen spring to mind, as their best fighters have multiple attacks but rely on Cold Blooded rather than full on immunity to psychology. Others, like Vampire Counts and Tomb Kings, don't give two tugs.
4. Blue Fire of Metamorphosis - another 9+ cast for a dubiously reliable magic missile. 2d6 hits is good, Strength d6+1 is untrustworthy. Conventional Lores often give you an 8+ for a Strength you can rely on. Warp Lightning this ain't.
5. Indigo Fire of Change - on an 11+, every model in the target enemy unit takes a S2 hit, and any that die turn into Horrors, placed in contact with the front of the target unit and counting as having charged! This one's psychologically damaging to say the least: while Horrors aren't up to much in a scrap, they can take on anything that dies from a S2 hit. Big units of lightweight troops will tremble at the dubious prospect.
6. Violet Fire of Tzeentch - 12+ cast, 6" range, single target model takes a Leadership test or DIES. No saves, no regenerating, no nothing. Given how easy it is for Tzeentch casters to fly, the short range isn't the drawback it usually is. This one's a gamble, but considering that it can snipe characters regardless of line of sight, being a unit, monstrous mountage, ANYTHING, it's worth a cast. If you're going terror-bombing with a Lord of Change or a Sorcerer on a Dragon, lead in with this horrible thing - cast it on your enemy's General and potentially watch their army crumble next turn.
7. Red Fire of Alteration - I am fate, come round at last; I am also a mediocre magic missile, only a 5+ cast and with d6 hits at d6 Strength. All the usual problems of a d6 hits magic missile and you can't even count on the Strength. Swap it out for something a level 2 wizard simply can't cast, but don't expect it to do anything. Fire and Death have better equivalents and Shadow's Creeping Death knocks it into a cocked hat because NO ARMOUR SAVES.

Lore of Slaanesh

Slaanesh magic is extremely underrated, especially for Mortals and Daemons. Its modest ranges aren't a big deal considering the caster can either fly or ride a Mount of Slaanesh, and Chaos armies absolutely love to control the terms on which their enemies can engage them - which is good, because this Lore is all about the board control and tipping the balance in key combats. It's less spectacular on Beastmen because the Shamans are a bit slower, but still addresses a lot of their weaknesses.

1. Blissful Throes - 6+, 12" range, d6 hits, S6. The S6 saves this one: while all the usual remarks about single die magic missiles still hold true, this one is strong enough that the single hit will probably kill a single wound model that it hits. (The words 'six', 'strength' and 'single' are fast losing all meaning for me here, by the way.) A good cast on cavalry, lone characters, even worth a go on a chariot or war machine; you won't one-hit-kill it, but you stand good odds of getting some wounds in against T4 or 5.
2. Luxurious Torment - 7+, casts on a friend or foe. The unit gains frenzy, even if normally immune to psychology, and while subject to frenzy takes d6 S3 hits per turn, distributed as shooting. Note that this is NOT a Remains in Play spell, so your Sorcerer can absolutely spam this one around like it's going out of fashion. I really rate this one. It's a good cast on your own Marauders or Beast Herds, helping them win fights and not panic, although they need lots of bodies to absorb the hits from the spell. It's not a bad cast on your own Warriors or Knights, who'll probably save the wounds. It can also be a giggle to cast on enemy skirmishers or fast cavalry, who suddenly get baited into fights they can't win, and take casualties even if they manage to restrain themselves.
3. Titillating Delusions - 8+, remains in play. Pick an enemy unit within 24". Pick a point it can see. Unit must move toward point as fast as possible and will charge anything you put in the way. A superb board control spell. Note that it works on units that are unbreakable or immune to psychology, and so is great for drawing roadblock units like Slayers or Flagellants into positions you don't want them to be in. Makes Tomb Kings players in particular very sad as their flying Hierophants suddenly find themselves drawn to stand right in front of a Keeper of Secrets. Breaks up Empire detachment geometry like a charm too. Pulls Generals out of their ideal Leadership range. Loads you can do with this.
4. Delectable Torture - 9+, 24" range, make a character attack their own unit. Not as good as the Tzeentch version, but it'll do if you have nothing else to use your dice on. Comes into its own against Wood and High Elves as it can make characters use ranged attacks on their own side if they have them: get this one off early and direct their Hail of Doom into the back of their own Dryads or something similarly hilarious.
5. Enrapturing Spasms - 10+, 24" range, the other board control spell. This one doesn't work on targets which are immune to psychology, and prevents its target from moving, casting, shooting or fighting in its next turn. If the unit's engaged or already fighting, they are hit automatically and don't fight back. It becomes immune to psychology but it CAN take Break tests and WILL flee if broken. Finally, and this is the secret kicker, if the unit is or contains a Wizard, any Remains In Play Spell they're upkeeping is immediately dispelled. Despite all the caveats about breaking and immunity, this spell is AMAZING for turning a key combat in your favour, silencing an artillery piece, freezing a death star or getting a nasty Curse of Years or similar out of play.
6. Delicious Excruciation - 11+, remains in play, turns the target Unbreakable. Cast on Daemons, it replaces Daemonic Instability, and that alone makes it fan-bloody-tastic since Slaanesh Daemons are on the squashy side and tend to take casualties in any circumstance when they're not striking first.

Lore of Nurgle

Most of the Lore of Nurgle is... unspectacular, limited to targeting single models or inflicting minor debuffs. It has mostly short ranges and its casters don't have a fast mount. Its control spell is more a ticking-off than a no-fun-allowed, and its aggressive spells struggle under the weight of low Strength and single d6 hits. However, they do all bypass armour saves, and sometimes - depending on what the stats of the target are - a -1 malus is all you need. Hold your nose, take a closer look, and you'll find a couple of solid, spammable damage spells plus some decent utility. Its real problem is that it's competing with Undivided casters who bring the Lore of Shadows - all the armour bypassing plus sweet, sweet movement spells.

1. Magnificent Buboes - 6+ cast, 18" range, single target takes a Toughness test or suffers a wound, no armour saves. By itself, a fiddly farty little nothing. Land it twice and a Hero dies. Land it three times and a Lord dies. Especially good for upsetting Skaven players (bye bye, Ratling Gun! so long, Warlock Engineer!). Take it on all your casters and worry the enemy for the whole game.
2. Favoured Poxes - 7+, 18" range, Remains in Play. Target enemy suffers -1 WS, BS, S and Ld. This is fine. Not hard to cast, does a lot of favours, but it's not exactly groundbreaking.
3. Effulgent Boils - 8+ cast, 24" range, d6 S4 hits, no armour save. Fine, but you'll probably have better things to do than cast it unless you were unlucky and didn't get Afflictions or Scabs.
4. Glistening Scabs - 9+ cast, 18" range, Remains in Play. -1 Toughness to a single target character. It's... look at what the other two Chaos lores can do with a 9+ spell, then look at this. Yes, it combos with Buboes, but since it Remains in Play you're giving up a Buboes attempt to get it there in the first place. Too niche for the casting cost. Dud of the book.
5. Glorious Afflictions - 10+, remains in play. Pick an enemy unit, anywhere on the battlefield, and halve its movement. The unlimited range and unconcern for line of sight save this one - it's not as powerful as the Slaanesh control spells but it IS a lot more lenient in terms of where it goes. A hidden gem.
6. Sumptuous Pestilence - 11+, 24" range, needs line of sight - target unit takes d6 S3 hits ignoring armour saves at the start of each magic phase (yours and theirs) for the rest of the game. This is NOT a Remains in Play spell and that's why it's good: once it's cast this sucker is staying cast and whittling away at its target basically forever. If you get this on a level 3 or 4 wizard you're laughing: just absolutely thrash it out, four dice that sucker every turn, get it on every unit you can as early as you can.

Tactics

AMBUSH!

The Beastman Ambush is a bit of a gimmick as, all else being equal, your Beast Herds will probably be doing the Ambushing and they only turn up where you want them slightly more than half the time. Nevertheless, it can work very well provided you stick to small Herds, with Warhounds on the table at the start, to fill up your Core slots, and then use your Specials for some more reliable troops (Chaos Warriors) to force engagements which the Beastmen then tip in your favour.