1750 CSM Counter Meta: Thoughts after NOVA
Last weekend was torn asunder by a little tournament known as NOVA. Over 200 players battled it out to determine the best 40k player on the east coast. The winning list at this event was built around a core of 4, yes 4, Riptides! While I believe this had a lot to do with the scenarios (which make denial units scoring in many scenarios), it is still something to keep in mind. The competitive Meta right now is high in S7 firepower, and often lacking in the ability to handle AV14. Thinking about that, and what I could really do to make the CSM book shine, I gave some thought to a few unusual choices, specifically Fabius Bile and Land Raiders.
Fabius Bile9 Chaos Marines: BP/CCW, 1 Meltagun, Mark of Slaanesh, Icon of Excess, Aspiring Champion with Power Weapon and Meltabombs 10 Enhanced Chaos Marines: BP/CCW, 2 Meltagus, Mark of Slaanesh, Icon of Excess, Aspiring Champion with Power Weapon 10 Chaos Cultists: 9 Autoguns 10 Chaos Cultists: 9 Autoguns 10 Chaos Cultists: 9 Autoguns
Heldrake: Baleflamer Heldrake: Baleflamer
Chaos Landraider: Dozer Blade, Dirge Caster Chaos Landraider: Dozer Blade, Dirge Caster 2 Obliterators: Mark of Nurgle, Veterans of the Long War
Total: 1,750
So the thoughts I had about this were pretty straight forward, with AV14, I can hopefully advance pretty far up the board, disembark, blow up a transport and hide in the safety of combat during the enemy shooting phase. The Chaos Marine units I took had to be durable and reliable. Initially I thought of taking some cult troops, but those are very pricy and often situational. Eventually I settled on Chaos Marines, but backed up by Fabius Bile. He is a fairly inexpensive HQ choice and will make 2 units fearless instead of 1, plus he enhances a unit to be very nasty with S5 and Fearless. The 3 units of cultists and 2 drakes were fairly obligatory, just to get more bodies on the board and something to help torch hard to get enemy scoring units.
I'm in the process of building the marines right now, then onto the Land Raiders, but I'll be sure to post a battle report once it's all ready!