Today let’s take a little bit deeper dive into the Chaos Changes from the 2020 General’s Handbook and see how they faired!
Sorry for the delay everyone on getting the final faction review from the Generals Handbook 2020 out.
I went over Order, Destruction, and Death earlier and was ready to cover Chaos and continue to do weekly articles. Then, of course, life got hectic again and I needed to use a lot of free time to help the family. Anyways, with things settling down and winter setting upon the Mitten state, my plan is to dive back into getting into a weekly rhythm of articles again and ramping up my hobby time again. Anyways, without further ado, here is my Chaos review of the General’s Handbook many weeks late.
2020 General’s Handbook: Chaos Changes
Beasts of Chaos:
- Tzaangors: Removed the large unit discount
- Chimera: Down 20 points
- Cygor: Down 40 points
- Ghorgon: Down 40 points
- Doombull: Down 20 Points
- Dragon Ogor Shaggoth: Down 10 Points
- Tzaangor Shaman: Down 10 Points
- Bullgors: Down 20 Points
- Cockatrice: Down 10 Points
- Dragon Ogors: Down 10 Points
- Tzaangor Enlightened on Discs of Tzeentch: Up 20 Points
- Brass Despoilers: Down 10 Points
- Pestilent Throng: Down 20 Points
- Phantasmagoria of Fate: Down 20 Points
- Thunderscorn Stormherd: Down 30 Points
Beasts of Chaos needs some love! As they had a lot of issues and struggled to win. Decreasing the points of a lot of the monster and behemoth models is a great way for players to be able to show off the amazing models in this army and still get a chance to win. Unfortunately, the lists with the most wins consisted of Tzaangor Enlightened on Discs and with the point increase to those that will hurt those Beast of Chaos players. Still, I think someone wanting to run a lot of cool monster models could do worse than this army.
Blades of Khorne:
- Skull Cannons: Down 10 points
- Bloodsecrator: Down 20 points
- Skarr Bloodwrath: Down 20 points
- Valkia the Bloody: Up 20 points
- Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage: Down 10 points
- Bloodthirster of Unfettered Fury: Down 30 points
- Skarbrand: Down 20 points
- Vorgaroth, the Scarred on Skalok the Skull Host of Khorne: Down 100 points
- Wrath of Khrone Bloodthirster: Down 20 Points
- Bloodcrushers: Down 20 points
- Mighty Skullcrushers: Down 20 Points
This is another army that needed some point decreases, just like the Beasts of Chaos. However, they are in a little bit of a better place because the Bloodthirster lists can be powerful. Also, it’s sweet to see so many huge daemons running across the board, the theme is on point. The mortal lists though I think still struggle in this army. As they are still being penalized for being some of the original AoS models (like liberators) and their rules are just not in line with the points.
It’s nice to see Vorgaroth go down 100 points, but let’s be honest, anyone who spends 600 bucks on a model and paints it is going to play it no matter what the point cost is.
Disciples of Tzeentch: (Using the online FAQ instead of GHB 2020)
- Horrors of Tzeentch: Up 20 points
- The Changeling: Up 20 points
- Flamers of Tzeentch: Up 20 points
As one of the stronger armies in the game, the point increases for the battle line unit is justified. There were also some nerfs to the army as a whole in the FAQ that I think were required as well. Overall though this is the same boat as the Blades of Khorne, where the mortal units are much more underpowered than the daemon portions. Pink Horrors are an incredibly strong battleline selection, and with the regeneration of Pink Horrors and splitting into Blue and Brimstone Horrors it is hard to move these guys off objectives.
Hendonites of Slannesh:
- Daemonettes: Removal of full unit discount
- The Contorted Epitome: Up 10 Points
- Keeper of Secrets: Up 20 Points
- Shalaxi Helbane: Up 20 Points
- Fiends: Down 20 points
- Hellstriders with Claw-spears: Up 10 points
- Hellstriders with Hellscourgers: Up 10 points
- Hedonite Host: Up 10 points
- Seeker Cavalcade: Up 10 points
- Supreme Sybarites: Up 20 points
- Wheels of Excruciation: Up 10 points
Some point increases, for the most part on the daemon units (see blades of Khorne and disciples of Tzeentch), but it was also needed as this is a strong army. The massive unit discount being lost hurts the most out of this. As a lot of people were running a lot of Daemonettes and it might cause them to have to tweak their lists a bit. Overall though I still expect Slannesh to do well in most games as their speed and attacks can hit really hard and get them where they need to be on any given turn.
Legion of Azgorh: No changes
Maggotkin of Nurgle:
- Plaguebearers: Down 10 points
- Lord of Afflictions: Down 10 points
- The Glottkin: Down 40 points
- Great Unclean One: Down 20 points
- Rotigus: Down 20 points
- Beasts of Nurgle: Down 10 points
- Nurglings: Down 20 points
- Plague Drones: Down 10 points
- Pusgoyle Blightlords: Down 10 points
- Putrid Blightkings: Down 20 points
- Affliction Cyst: Down 60 points
- Blight Cyst: Down 60 points
- Nurgle’s Menagerie: Down 60 points
- Plague Cyst: Down 60 points
- Tallyband of Nurgle: Down 60 points
- Thricefold Befoulment: Down 60 points
Everyone’s best friend Nurgle had a bit of a point reduction and I think it is well justified, especially the battalions. This is the one daemon army where the mortals can go toe to toe with their daemon counterparts. Which makes for a very fun army to mix and match with. They are still slow and mortal wounds sweep through them (just like they do for everyone) but being able to field more models might help with that in some games.
Skaventide:
- Plagueclaw: Down 10 points
- Doomwheel: Down 10 points
- Grey Seer: Up 20 points
- Warlock Bombardier: Up 20 points
- Warlock Engineer: Up 10 points
- Grey Seer on Screaming Bell: Up 40 points
- Lord Skreech Verminking: Up 20 points
- Plague Priest on Plague Furnace: Up 20 points
- Thanquol on Boneripper: Down 10 points
- Verminlord Corruptor: Up 20 points
- Verminlord Deceiver: Up 20 points
- Plague monks: Up 10 points
- Verminlord Warbringer: Up 20 points
- Verminlord Warpseer: Up 60 points
- Rat Ogors: Down 10 points
- Ratling Gun: Down 20 points
- Skrye Acolytes: Smaller max unit size
- Stormfiends: Smaller max unit size
- Stormvermin: Down 40 points no massive unit discount anymore
- Arkhspark Voltik: Down 50 points
- Gascloud Chokelung: Down 50 points
- Gautfyre Skorch: Down 50 points
- Rattlegauge Warplock: Down 50 points
- Whyrlblade Threshik: Down 50 points
- Warp Lightning Vortex: Down 20 points
Some minor tweaks up and down across a good chunk of the army. I think that won’t affect the playstyle too much for Skaven players and they will still be a pretty dominant army against most opponents. A lot of the point reductions were for the battalions, which is always nice. I feel like those are always overpriced when they first come out. The Warpseer jumping 60 points hurt as that is a big jump. My biggest surprise was the Warp Lightning Vortex dropping in points, as that is a very powerful spell.
Slaves to Darkness / Everchosen: (From Online FAQ)
- Chaos Marauders: Up 10 points
- Chaos Warriors: Down 10 points
- Lord on Karkadrak: Down 20 points
- Chaos Knights: Down 20 points
- Chaos Marauder Horsemen: Up 20 points
- Varanguard: Down 20 points
- Darkfire Daemonrift: Up 30 points
I still think many of the Slaves to Darkness / Everchosen units are overpriced for what they do. Especially in the magic heavy meta that we are currently in. Personally, I think an additional 10 – 20 point decrease on all the units that dropped put them more in line with what they do. The Marauders are a solid battleline unit but not enough to require a point increase. Regardless, this army has some amazing models in the Varanguard so it is good to see them drop in points. (still expensive though)
There you have it my long-delayed take on the Chaos armies from the 2020 GHB, again I apologize for the inconsistency of the articles this year it has been challenging to say the least.
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