Tinkering with CSM 2k

Ok, with several 2k events around the corner I wanted to tweak my CSM list. Lemme know what you think - basically my current strategy of dropping in Raptors and using 5-man daemon units to sit on objectives just isn't holding up against hard hitting lists. This is what I came up with after chewing the fat w/ Monkey, D, and Wildeyed:

HQ:
Daemon Prince - wings, warptime, bolt, mark of tzeentch
-Use: CC machine, needs warptime to survive my rolling.

Sorceror - mark of slaanesh, lash of submission
-hides in a rhino w/ plague marines

Elite:
5 Chosen w/ Rhino (w/ combi-melta) - 3x melta, 2x plasma

5 Chosen w/ Rhino (w/ combi-melta) - 3x melta, 2x plasma
-Normally I don't like to split fire types, but since these will be outflanking i'm going to have to hedge my bets or risk winding up with the wrong weapon on the wrong side of the board.

Troops:
9 Plague Marines w/ Rhino (combi-melta) - 2x melta, champ w/ pfist, icon

10 Plague Marines w/ Rhino (combi-melta) - 2x melta, champ w/ pfist, icon

10 Zerkers w/ Rhino (combi-melta) - champ w/ pfst, icon

Heavy:
2x oblits

2x oblits

thoughts? I could drop the bolt off the DP and a plague marine off the bigger squad in order to put a Pfist in each chosen squad, but i'm not sure...

The chosen are way to small with no bodies to take wounds they won't last long, also outflanking is nice till the time they roll up on the wrong side of the battle. The prince i say drop MoT and bolt and just give him nurgle a T6 prince that is cheaper seems to work better, but still expect him to die most games. I love berserkers but in a rhino they really seem to be lacking.

Fletch has nailed it on the Tzeentch prince. I have never had any luck with bolt. Not in my marines and not in my Daemons. No ablative wounds on the Chosen is a bit of a downer as well. If you are planning on them being a glass hammer and really only getting one good round out of them then they will serve that purpose just fine. Having the two units will help make sure you get at least one of them on the right board edge.

The Berzerkers are another tricky spot. That many Berzerkers are a huge fire magnet. The Rhino just isn't going to give them the protection that they need. Something that you could try is cutting the number way down. Even 6 Zerkers with a PF will put a hurt on pretty much anything - and six dudes in a Rhino suddenly doesn't seem like a top priority compared to a Lash Sorceror and a Daemon Prince. I have had the best luck running them in a rhino 5 strong with a Khorne lord with a Bloodfeeder. It is a wacky little unit that can deliver some hurt but is small enough to be ignored for a turn or two.

I mostly agree with what Fletch and Big D are putting out there. The most effective prince is a Nurgle Prince with wings and warptime. I run him and he's the biggest fire magnet I've ever seen, so the extra toughness is a huge help. The fact that he's as big a threat in melee as he is, means he's going to take a beating early but that means your zerkers will get to play, and they can dish out just as much(if not more) as the prince when it comes to hth. That said, if you're set on keeping the Tzeentch Prince, I would recommend Wind of Chaos over Bolt(Doom or Change). Since you get to reroll all to wound rolls and Wind wounds on a 4+ with no armor or cover saves. Basically you've got a flamer that says 3/4 of these guys are dead. Did I mention it also glances vehicles on a 4+ too? Pretty sick combo if you ask me.

The Chosen units are small and really can't take a hit, not to mention they're one of our units that will run if you lose even 2 guys and roll poorly. I've found that termicide works better for that late game trump card as far as dropping just about any tank, not to mention they'd make the icons you've placed on your units just that much more useful. Not to mention the termicide is about 50 points cheaper, 105 for 3 Termis with Combi Meltas. I've also seen people give them Combi-Plasmas as a way to clear opposing terminators.

For the PM squads, I feel you may be wasting a few points by making them 9 or 10 strong. One of their main appeals is that you can have 2 Meltas in a minimum sized group. Running them 7 strong has been highly effective for me and has been what I've seen run elsewhere. It's also fluffy being nurgle's number and all...

Same as above for the Zerkers, not only is running a 10 man unit a big fire magnet (one you don't want, unlike the Prince) but it's also usually overkill. Running anything over 8 strong is usually asking for trouble. Even in an 8 man unit, assuming the Champ has a PFist, you're dishing out 28 S5 I5 attacks and 4 S9 I1 attacks. There's very little that can survive a beating like that and walk out of it unscathed.

Dropping those 7 models(the 5 PMs and 2 Zerkers) would free up 157 points which is enough for a Vindicator or Defiler, or if you prefer to stay away from the Heavies, a few small units of Lesser Daemons. One other thing you may be interested in trying, is to give the Chosen and Champ and Icon, infiltrate them, and use them as a summoning points for lesser daemons or even potentially a greater daemon. Since the Greater is only 100 points it wouldn't be hard to give the chosen that icon if you dropped the rhino.

Ok, so here is the list I wound up taking to SoCH3

HQ
DP-
wings, warptime, MoT

Sorceror-
MoS, lash


Elite
6x Chosen in a Rhino w/ Combi Melta
-2x melta
-2x plasma

6x Chosen in a Rhino w/ Combi Melta
-2x melta
-2x plasma

Troops
7x Plague Marines in a Rhino w/ Combi melta
-2x meltaguns
-champ w/ pfist

7x Plague Marines in a Rhino w/ Combi melta
-2x meltaguns
-champ w/ pfist

6x Khorne Berzerkers in a Rhino w/ Combi melta
-champ w/ pfist

6x Khorne Berzerkers in a Rhino w/ Combi melta
-champ w/ pfist

Heavy
2x Oblits

2x Oblits


Thanks for the advice, i wound up splitting up the squads to give myself more frontage (and more melta shots) which saved the day for me. The Chosen performed much better than expected. Game one they netted me a dakka-pred and a contest, game two they each ate a Hammerhead, game 3 they popped on and melta'd a landraider and a contest. The MoT prince was also my MVP taking only 2 wounds across a three turn combat w/ the named BT hero, his squad o' powerweapon guys, and a dred. 4+ invul for the win. Of course small arms fire (i.e. rapid firing tau squads) will eat his face every time.

You punished me in round 2 for what it's worth haha

How did your Zerkers run for you? I've never run them under 8 strong and I'm very interested in how they performed at 6. I would also like to know if the lash sorcerer worked. I've pretty much been of the school '2 lash or no lash' for a while now and want to know if it was worth it to run only one.

The 'zerkers did fine at 6. Fearless helps out a lot. I could definitely look at bumping them up to 8 for more attacks, but the biggest drawback was playing 2/3 MEQ armies.
"Oh you did 10 wounds? That's 2 dead marines."

The Lash Sorc works great. Bunker him in a rhino w/ PM and you can do whatever you want with him. I like to park it in cover and wait until I have to use him. Usually it's the last turn objective smash or moving footslogging squads backwards to get another round of Oblit fun on their heads. I think the biggest reason i've kept him is the fact that I don't know what i'd replace him with. Now that SW and Nids are going to soon abound, I'm thinking about a Slaanesh Lord w/ ID daemon wep, but I just didn't get around to tinkering w/ the list until after the tourney.

I've found the same problem with the zerkers, only 1 power weapon in the whole unit really softens the blow. The biggest issue I've had with them recently is, oddly enough, against Ork lists when dealing with Nobz. Between armor saves, FNP, and 2 wounds per model, even counting FC and bonus attacks, can only get through 5.2 wounds and only 2.9 outside the charge. Basically 2 dead on the charge and 1 dead in following turns. This isn't counting the Fist Champ, but still I'm not sure how better to deal with Nobz at this point. Even with the fist that's only 2.2 wounds on the charge and 1.7 normal, so collectively 5.4 wounds(4 dead) on the charge and 4.6(2, maybe 3, dead) in the following combats. Even when shooting them and avoiding combat there's not much I can do to deal with the multiple wound situation. Granted, a Slaanesh Lord would be able to deal with Nobz, but even still at only S4 vs T4 he's still only killing 2-3 models a turn, which vs MCs is beautiful but against smaller multi-wound models is barely worth mentioning.

If you want to blast Nobz and/or Nob Bikers out you'll have to bring the Defiler or the Vindicator. They will chew through most armies assault troops. That's why I run them in my ork list

Yeah, Defiler/Vindi is all I've been able to come up with as well, I've been considering dropping my Rot Prince and putting in my Defiler or Vindi in his place, especially since he underperformed amazingly the last 4 games he's been in, but both the Defiler and Vindi are not very effective at 2k as a one-of. This leads me to trying to find a different type of Prince, preferably Nurgle, to run. I could try dropping one of my 3 PM squads to find points to fit in some more stuff. Did 4 Troop choices work well for you or did you feel a bit stretched?

Yeah, that's the big risk with 1 Defiler or 1 Vind - people will destroy them first turn every game. And for 1 Defiler, you can have 2 oblits.

Guess that depends on what you mean by 'stretched.' Like I had too few to do the job? Not really. They have really good synergy, PM sit on back field objectives, zerkers move up. If I did drop my lash sorc, I could fill out all the squads some..that might help too...not really sure....