The Chaos Space Marine army us configured to work better as a close combat army. However this does not have to be true. And even if you are playing a close combat army, having some heavy fire power to clear the route in is always useful.
Most heavy support options have big guns so they do not have to get so close to the enemy to do dammage. Unlike most other armies the Chaos Heavy support nomally have some close combat ability too. This means that the Chaos Space Marine Heavy Support can move up the table during the game giving troops some close support fire power, or leave them sitting on objectives knowing that if one of the opponent squads turn up to take the objective then you don’t have to give it up without a fight!
Chaos Havoc Space Marine Tactics
Havocs are regular Chaos Space Marines that have a special fondness for heavy and special weapons.
Unlike the Imperial Space Marine Heavy Weapon squads the Chaos Space Marine Havocs can be configured to have either a heavy weapon role or a close support role by arming the Chaos Havocs with special weapons.
Remembrr that all Havocs have have a Bolt Pistol, frag and krak grenades. This means that if you need them to, they can act as a half decent assault squad too.
Space Marine Havocs with no special weapons
You do not have to arm your Havocs with either heavy weapons or special weapons. This allows you to create some more tactical squads at the same points cost. Remember that in the 7th edition all units can capture objectives. This means that if you drop a Havoc squad on an objective and have them hold the objective and provide fire support at the same time.
Flakk Missiles
The Havoc missile launches can be upgraded to have Flakk missiles. This upgrade does make the missile launchers expensive in points costs, but it does give your army some anti-aircraft abilities. If you think that you will be facing flyers then this upgrade is well worth the points.
Obliterator Cult Tactics
Obliterators are Chaos Terminators chat have been further corrupted by the forces of Chaos. This coruption means that they can morph and change during the battle to allow you to pick and choose the best weapon for the jot that turn.
There is a limitation to picking which weapon to use though. That is that you cannot choose to use the same weapon on two consecutive turns. With this in mind, it is useful to think at least a turn ahead so you do not pick a weapon thiis turn that you will be better off using next turn.
Another feature of Obliterators is that they are slow. Obliterators do not come with transport by default. You can deep strike the Obliterators on to yhe table, however yhis means that they are not av ailable for the first turn, and maybe for the first few turns. One solution to thi may be to team them up with a Land Raider. The Land Raider ca hold a unit of 3 Obliterators easily, and transport them around the table relitivly quickly. The down side is that the Land Raider will need a seperate Heavy Support slot and has a hefty point cost.
Obliterators are Daemons in Terminator armour. This gives them 2+ regular saver and a 5+ invulnrable save. Obliterators also have Power fists like Terminators do too. This means that they are tough in a close combat fight too. Be careful though, as there are only 3 Oblitorators in a unit tops, you will be in danger of being out numbered.
Defiler Tactics
The Chaos Space Marine Defiler is a walking battle tank that has a crab like appearance. There is nothing like this in the Imperial armies.
The Defiler has a number of configuration options. This will allow you to configure the Defiler as a close combat creature or as a heavy weapons platform. If you know your opponent ahead of time then you may be able to pick one of these configurations, however if you are going to be facing a number of different opponents then you may wish to configure the Defiler with a mixture of both close combat and ranged weapons to give the Defiler a more flexible tactical unit.
Strength and Weapons
As the Defiler is a walker it has the ability to assault other units. In assault it is armed with two power fists. So it gets one extra attack and this is has the strength doubled to the maximum of S10. An interesting upgrade is that the Defiler can swap it’s Reaper Cannon for a third power fist giving the Defiler two additional attacks.
Introduction to Forgefiends and Maulfiends
The Chaos Forgefiends and Maulfiends are new additions to the 2012 Codex Chaos Space Marine, so I thought that they could do with a bit of and introduction. If ;only because then I will only have to write it once, and not once per entry!
To simplify things, Forgefiends and Maulfiends are oversized, Daemon possessed walkers. The Forgefiend is configured for medium range ( 18 to 24 inch weapon range ), and the Maulfeind is configured for close combat.
Forgefiend Tactics
The Chaos Forgefiend is a monstrous creature sized Dreadnaught configured for medium ranged fire support for your assault troops, or to thin out horde troops like Tyranids and Orks, and maybe Imperial Guard.
Maulerfiend Tactics
Like the Chaos Forgefiend, the Chaos Space Marine Maulerfiend is a daemon possessed monstrous creature sized dreadnaught. However the Maulerfiend is configured for close combat.
Chaos Land Raider Tactics
The Land Raider is an iconic Space Marines and Chaos Space Marine main battle tank. Unlike the Imperial Space Marines the Chaos Space Marines only get the standard Lascannon version of the Land Raider. You can upgrade the Land Raider with the usual Chaos Tank upgrades like demonic possession, if you don’t mind the odd Terminator being swallowed in the interest of repairing a hull point every now and then.
Land Raiders great for taxing assault troops around the battle field. The Land Raider’s armour 14 all round will keep your troops fairly safe, and the Assault ramp allows the troops disembark and assault in the same turn.
Chaos Vindicator Tactics
The Chaos Vindicator is similar to its loyalist Space Marine counterpart. It offers a lot of short ranged punch. It works better on smaller tables and built up areas.
Chaos Predator Tactics
The Chaos Predator is a upgraded Rhino that can be configured for a verity of different support roles.