Chaos on the Ladder: Style over Substance

[3DHouseOfBeef]

So there is much discussion about what race sucks or is unbalanced or whatnot, with everyone always throwing their two cents in as to why this or that race is strong or weak. After a few hundred games as Chaos on the 1v1 ladder, before and after the patch, I think Chaos is the whipping boy of this game. I do well until I hit about 1450+, then the good players prove Chaos wrong.

I'm not just saying this because I suck. The painful truth is shown on the ladder rankings.

***********************************************************************
As of right now, there is ONE... YES ONE Chaos player in the top 30 players on the 1v1 ladder.
***********************************************************************

Good job WC_Sleign for being the top Chaos player at 11th.

So one Chaos player in the top 30, and NONE in the top 10.
(As of the time of this posting, yes I know they move around all day and this data may not be exactly accurate whenever you go check it)

If it was just a matter of player skill, and the races were balanced, I would expect to see a roughly equal breakdown of races represented on the list. However what you see is an absence of Chaos. There are some more scattered around the bottom of the top 100 list, but still underrepresented at 17 total.

Yes, I know in the overall race rankings Chaos is doing well at 54%. However, this is not at the top level of play. Chaos is successful in the sub 1500 rankings where a good rush vs. an average player can still net you a win. The top ladder stats show what happens to Chaos when both players are consistantly good. Chaos simply doesn't have the answers to the questions posed by a well played opponent.

I have looked at the top Chaos replays (Thank you WC_Sleign and Oneguy for posting, you both are amazing players) for tips, but I am not seeing Chaos defeating opponents because Chaos is powerful, I am seeing opponents who gambled on early generators or tried a failed scout rush and suffered the fate that they deserved. When Chaos wins it is usually amazing micro coupled with a favorable map and build by the enemy that sets them back too far to beat Chaos. Rarely do I see a replay where it was a trait of Chaos that was the winning element... generally whatever Chaos did to win, Space Marines could have done, and done it better. I have no doubt that the top Chaos players would do better with Space Marines.

Before you start telling me how Possessed Space Marines are amazing, you'll notice that the top Chaos players on the ladder rarely use them. At the top level of play their huge cost is better spent elsewhere. The PSM rush does not win top level games. If you haven't won the game in the first encounter, you need to tech up to counter what the opponent will be coming back with... Wartraks, Dark Reapers, Dreadnaughts or whatnot, rarely is PSM the counter you can count on.

So if I am wrong, please let me know. If you are a top ranked Chaos player, tell me what you think Chaos gives you as an advantage that is worth picking Chaos over Space Marines. If you have a secret Chaos plan for victory against the top players, please share it. Or better yet, go crush your enemies and move up the ladder to represent Chaos. As it is the racial breakdown on the ladder seems to be pretty good evidence of how Chaos fails at the top level of play. I'd love to think Chaos can compete against the other races of this game, as it is, regardless of all the talk and theorycraft, the proof is in the rankings.

Looking for answers,
-3D House of Beef

[ChunkyMrEvil]

Every race has been said to be too weak. Look back a few pages and you'll find topics like "Orks iz teh worst!" or "SM need betterness!", and a LOT of "Eldar sucks, make 'em stronga!"

[3DHouseOfBeef]

Which was why I covered that issue in the first sentence of my post. The point is, this isn't idle speculation or theorycraft. It's about the fact that there is only one Chaos player in the top 30 players on the ladder.

I am an old gamer. I have seen lots of games and lots of forums. People (usually with a feeble grasp of balance issues) always complain about everything imaginable.

However, looking at the 1v1 ladder stats, it is clear that the Eldar do not suck, the Orks are not the worst, and SM do not need to aquire more "betterness".

What is clear... (and the ladder ranking is fact, not speculation) is that Chaos cannot beat the other races at the top of the ladder. If this was just a matter of me complaining without good reason, you could point to the ladder and show me all the successful Chaos players in the top 10. As of right now, there are none.

-3D House of Beef

[.42.]

Chaos is under represented at the top of the ladder. I don't know if this is because of a weakness in Chaos or if it's just that people don't like them.

WC_Sleign and KS_Josey_Wales have gotten to the top but they are just exceptional players and could probably do it with any of the races.

PSM are good but I have yet to see a replay of WC_Sleign using them or the sacrifical pit.

I do wish that cultist were a bit better meatshield or that they could go toe to toe melee with scouts and win.

edit:
ps I just had a thought I nerver reenfoce the cultists maybe I should :Slap:

[Moe]

I think Josey got in trouble for playing during work hours

[.42.]

hehe but with him playing chaos it looked more balanced :P

[-|EoT|-Havoc]

house of beef i must agree with you, ive been playing with chaos before and after patch, around the 1400-1500, but it just doesnt seem to get higher there.
Ive now started playing eldar with another account and noticed they were a lot easier to win with, ive now also got a 1450 score with them, while im not nearly as skilled with eldar as i am with chaos.

[Alpha_1]

This is exactly the kind of observation and comments that the developers need to make sure the game is well balanced.

Any ideas as to how the balance might be acheived 3DHoB? You have a good grasp of the game surely you have some thoughts?

ChunkyMrEvil,

You need to learn to read, and if that isn't the problem try to understand the points being made, what did you do, not evewn read his first 2 paragraghs?

[3DHouseOfBeef]

.42.

I do wish that cultist were a bit better meatshield or that they could go toe to toe melee with scouts and win.

edit:
ps I just had a thought I nerver reenfoce the cultists maybe I should

FYI, if you overwatch your Cultists and they overwatch the Scouts, it ends up tying up both units until something changes. Problem with that is that you have just tied up one fifth of your 10/10 starting population cap (2/10) and you are only tying up one tenth of the Space Marines population cap (1/10).

So you can decide what you want to do there on a case by case basis. You can not overwatch, fight them, and lose. Overwatch, and stalemate them, but because of pop cap be at an overall disadvantage (generally means the main fight elsewhere will be 3 Scout + 3 SM + Force Commander vs. 2 CSM + 1 Cultist + Chaos Lord), or run and lose whatever point you were trying to capture to save the cultists. Not very good options. At least Cultists beat Guardians and Slugga Boyz... oh wait... that's right they lose to everyone. :duck:

-3D House of Beef

[apettican]

Hmm, cultists are a funny one. To start with, they are certainly not 2 cap units, but fill them up and add grenade launchers, and they certainly aren't 1 cap units either.

I find the absence of chaos at the top quite suprising, why doesnt the bigger squad size give them an advantage over SM?? One thing that may count against them is in scenarios where the players are even, and they both give ground to lick wounds and tech up(I assume this happens when 2 equal players meet at any level). In this case, chaos have nothing cheap and effective like speeders, and defilers cant match up against a dread.

Just my thoughts, feel free to pull em apart.

Andy

[[Vertigo]]

I have to agree with the posts here. I am a dedicated Chaos player, so far I am 1450 on the ladder but I find I can't get any higher than that. I can't quite put my finger on what is wrong with Chaos. I can only give generalizations about us.

The main problem I have is trying to use the racial traits of Chaos; being strong in melee only helps against Space Marines. Eldar can just activate Fleet of Foot and run away from you, and Orks just run you over. So it is extremely difficult to use one of our biggest advantages.

The Taint of Chaos buildings does not help when you are fighting around your base; the effects of it are to weak to turn the tides of battle in your favor. if you want proof of this, try fighting off an Ork Slugga rush in your base with two sqauds of Cultist, two sqauds of CSMs, and one Chaos Lord.

We have no light vehicles, only a moderatly good combination walker and a piss poor excuse for a tank. Both of which are way to expensive to field properly. That is how they should be, the defiler is a combi-walker/artillery that does just about everything well enough, but the Predator is extreamly weak. When it rolls off the machine cult it is only good agaist infantry. Its main cannon isn't good enough to justify buying a Predator. Untill you can replace the autocannon with a twin linked laz cannon, at teir three, the Predator has no use when you first get it.

Possessed Space Marines are great, really they are one of the best Chaos units in our arsenal. So why don't more people use them? The cost of the Sac pit is why. For 250req and 100power I can move into teir 2. Not a very hard choice to make. I would rather upgrade my exsisting CSMs then get more, expensive, units. But the PSMs are priced where they need to be.

Horrors are a different stroy; they are just as expensive as PSMs but are horrible units (no pun intented). They drop fast under fire, you can't reinforce them, they deal very little damage compared to their price. Sure you can deepstrike them, but that doesn't help the fact they are a sub-par unit to begin with.

thats all I can think of for now.

[3DHouseOfBeef]

Any ideas as to how the balance might be acheived 3DHoB?

After reading lots of gaming forums, I cringe every time I see a suggestion for balance change posed by your average player. Usually they are just something along the lines of "I have played seven games now, and Chaos needs to start with a Bloodthirster... with lasers for eyes... that leaves a trail of chaotic goo that randomly changes the map every six minutes". Having read hundreds of similar suggestions, I hesitate to put myself in that camp.

I would like to hear what the top players think might help though. I'd love to see some good counter-strategies that work. The developers spent a lot of time working on balance, I only have a few hundred games under my belt. Chances are if I made a suggestion, it has probably been tried at some point.

I'd really like to see what some of the issues were during testing that made them make this or that decision about unit costs, unit power and population caps. I look at the cultist population cost of 2, and think it is steep. I also think 1 would probably be low, as 10 grenade squads after an armory would terrify our poor Ork friends. A starting pop cap of 12 might make the cultist price seem better, but who knows what was tested. Maybe KS_Josey_Wales owned the other testers with Chaos so badly, they got scared. :argh:

There are so many elements to balance, I can't think of one easy way to resolve an issue without breaking something else. I mean when I see that first Bonesinger appear in my base I am thinking, "That builder is stronger than my Cultists and my Heretics...". At which point I am usually running my heretics around, wishing they were building things, and taking a beating until my CSM get built. For me it isn't just one thing that seems to be a bad matchup, but a combination of things that are hard to overcome as a whole.

Maybe some of the top Chaos players could chime in and tell us what they find to be particularly problematic, or better yet, tell us how they overcome these apparent disadvantages.

-3D House of Beef

[*Eroes*]

This is exactly the kind of observation and comments that the developers need to make sure the game is well balanced.

Any ideas as to how the balance might be acheived 3DHoB? You have a good grasp of the game surely you have some thoughts?

Alpha, seems to me the answer is obvious: Cultists need a boost [they're supposed to be meatshield. Eehehe! Too bad their 95hp make'em totally useless as wall of meat].
And Defilers, like any other walker, need using 2pop cap.

I do not even speak about their totally useless tier3

[[Vertigo]]

For me it isn't just one thing that seems to be a bad matchup, but a combination of things that are hard to overcome as a whole.

I have that same feeling when I am playing online. It is like all of our units are way too expensive for what they do. Cultist, for example, being way too weak for a meat shield and costing two cap each, but on the flip side they would be way over powered if they costed one cap each.

[ShadeKnight]

I'm primarily a Chaos player, and to be honest, I just don't know. The Chaos seem as though they are pretty well balanced with the other races, but there may be a thing or two about them that could be tweaked to even the field a bit more. The first thing that comes to mind is a lack of light vehicles for Chaos. There is no Wartrack, Speeder, or Vyper equivalent that you can get out there quickly. That being said, the Chaos just isn't an army thats about their vehicles (which is, IMO, the primary factor that sets them apart from the Space Marines). The number and power of infantry units they can put on the field is really quite nice, with vehicles being used mainly for fire support (at least by me), or occasionaly use a Defiler or two to mix up your CC forces if you want to show your opponent a different look. I think a light weapon add-on that can be upgraded for the Rhino might be a possible way to address this if its the way Relic wanted to go. Also, a slight augmentation of the Defiler's HP might also help on the vehiclar part of the equation. Not much mind you, since it is an incredibly versatile vehicle, but maybe enough to let it last another second or two against another walker.

That being said, I think if you want to enhance the Chaos army, you need to focus on the infantry, since that is their bread and butter. The Tactical and Raptor squads are perfectly fine and better than the Space Marine basic infantry (mostly same stats, but more per squad, plus Furious Charge upgrade and heavy weapons on Raptors). The cultists are overall pretty good, I think. The only thing I would change would be increase their individual hitpoints by just a bit, no more than 30 or so. This would allow them to fill the early game meat shield role more effectively without giving them too much of an advantage. And 3DHoB, I don't think that the Scouts and Cultists coming to a draw on overwatch is such a bad thing since Chaos get two more marines in their Tactical and Raptor squads than Space Marines, and since those two extra Tactical guys can cloak with the rest of their buddies. Horror squads might have their damage increased a bit. I have no problem with them being fragile since the Chaos is an assualt oriented army and they are support fire, but I think that they need a little something else since they can't reinforce. A moderate damage increase would take care of this quite nicely. Its hard for me to complain about Possessed Marines. They just kill so much. I think that for what you're getting, the cost is completely justified. After all, they have over 900 HP apiece, can be upgraded to be effective against everything, and are, I think, one of the best infantry units in the game. The only change I would make to them is to possibly decrease their build time by just a bit. Maybe 4 seconds less to get them out of the pit and a second a piece for reinforcing in the field. Obliterators are also very nice units, some of the best fire support in the game. Its hard to argue with something that carries a gun for every situation on it's arm. But I do think that maybe their damage out put could be a little higher. The only way I would do this would be to chop 800 HP off of each the individual unit's health (they have about 1016 as it is now) and allow them to reinforce to five units. This way the full squad is just as fragile, but has a bit more punch.

Again, I think that the armies on the whole are really balanced pretty well. Any changes that are made should be small and in keeping with the themes of both the army and the individual units. But I think these might be, if Relic decides any Chaos changes are needed (since I think they probably know the game a lot better than most of us, and definately better than me), these might be at least a decent place to start.

[Aetherfox]

I am not a top player in DoW either, but that is because my current connection does not allow me to play on Gamespy. But I do have 10 years of experience in RTS games, and have competed at RTS tournaments before.

The way things look I would actually be in favour of scrapping the Tier 3 of Chaos altogether, and give them everything in Tier 2 already. Daemon Pit in Tier 2 = more usage of Obliterators, perhaps overpowered but then counters to heavy infantry high already exist in tier 2, and really only strong point of Oblits is their armour. Tier 2 Bloodthirster is in no way overpowered, prerequisite to have all other structions up and running of course. Tier 2 Laser Predators is fine, if a bit strong. Sacrificial Pit should cost less, to make it an attractive option before uprading to Tier 2. Defilers be 2 vpop. Chaos Rhino projecting Taint of Chaos. Starting pop cap to 12.

This isn't changing anything that Chaos players really use and abuse at the moment, so I doubt it makes them that much stronger as a race. However, the idea here is to make the other techs more accessible and give Chaos a larger diversity in strategies and flexibility when dealing with threats, not increase their power level directly.

[[Vertigo]]

However, the idea here is to make the other techs more accessible and give Chaos a larger diversity in strategies and flexibility when dealing with threats, not increase their power level directly.

That is it, right there! Chaos has lots of unique infantry units that are not accessible. Our primary strength is our infantry. PSMs, CSMs, Oblits, and Horrors. But each of those units requires a seperate building to get access to each one. And I can tell you that those buildings are not cheap. Unlike the Eldar who get cheap buildings and very strong specilized units we have to pay through the nose to get ours. And the Eldar and Orks only have 2 primary buildings to produce infantry

As for ballance changes:

I would like to see Cultist with a few more hitpoints. The Sac pit needs to be much more cheaper, it should cost about 100/50. Horrors are easy, just make them cheaper to field, like about 150/75/2; they are no way near the power of their cost right now. The Predator needs to either be cheaper to produce, or it needs a massive damage buff to the main cannon. I'm leaning towards the price reduction for the tank. SM needs to have a cheaper pred as well.

[First And Only]

Chaos definitely has some problems. One major problem is how worthless cultists are against a rush of CC units. Chaos is heavily disadvantaged against Orks and Eldar opening fights. Orks especially. However I don't have a good solution in my head at the moment, because it's pretty easy to overpower cultists, and we have to keep in mind that any changes to Cultist durability affects gren launcher spam.

[{EG}Dark-Odin]

I play the Chaos and the Eldar, and I am fine with em both but just by bringing across the point of this race is weak then this and that race is weak then that and so on it's stupid because at the end of the day each race has something wrong with them lets see

Eldar: are very weak at close combat even the banshees when you lower there morale and the sheer council, in the beginning of a game they can be easily rushed by a group of 2 chaos marines squads, by that time they would have like one unit out or a farseer or both and even then the farseer is so crap it dies hell if a guy attacks with a marine squad and a FC/CL they die also there rangers they cost way to much for nothing

Chaos: I have played these and I think they have the best close combat units I mean come on More fire power damage then the SM theres more fair enough morale is crap and they die badly when they lose it however they have more damage and hell when you get the possessed out fully upgraded with all researches my god these are the ultimate close combat unit god termies stand no chance against em if they have no leader attached or a medic they lose morale and fall like flies so I like to call em the Anti-termi unit oh the wonders of the possessed the cultists I dont really use em much and if I still have a few upgraded I just upgrade em with launchers and hide em behind my hardened CM or usaly I have my raptor in front then my grenade launchers cultist and CM just lay the floor with the stuff infront.

I do find some stuff does cost to much for the stuff they do not just on Choas but Eldar to even when there pointless the rangers are the most pointless unit in the entire game they do nothing and they decreased the morale damage they do in the latest patch I think not sure and that’s made em more pointless and a group of cultists do more damage then a sm scouts or eldar guardians and mine win all the time so I'm not sure where your going with sm kick your arse maybe they have them upgraded with 2 snipers and that’s what hits your guys and morale thus making em so weak the scouts finish em off, er yeah I'm done now.

[Sanguinius_nz]

@ Dark Odin:
Umm banshees are one of the best CC units in the game they will kill assault marines and raptors and decimate chaos marines and and marines, one game I played against a chaos player his possessed spent more time running away from my banshees, it wasnt untill he got possessed flamer upgrade then abused F2 so they fried my banshees morale before switching back to melee that he actually managed to kill 1 squad of banshees (it was too late for him by then anyway).

Back on topic, I feel more than anything else that hold chaos back against other armies is they have trouble against armour they have no anti vehcile weapons beyond missiles untill they can get lascannon preds this generally means a large proportion of chaos troops end up armed with missiles instead of plasma or HBs to counteract enemy infantry.

Chaos are also forced to be more sneaky than other races (even more so than eldar) and I feel making good use of infiltrate to lay traps and attack enemy bases is something a lot of chaos players just dont do.

[Sinbad]

When I play chaos vs eldar or ork, I only tech to tier 2 for missles. Vs chaos and SM I tech to get plasma. All other their 2 and 3 chaos units are either not effective or too expensive to field properly. Teir one is where chaos is suppose to shine b/c of horros and psm, however even these units fall into the not effective (horrors) or too expensive (PSM in early game when they are most effictive) categories. It seems to me that the CSM units are suppose to be the main force of the army and all other units are suppose to be their support (just like SMs' army setup) however the other units are not well suited for supportment role because:
a) Are not a specific counter to anything but try to be buff on their own (PSM).
b) When you need to counter something the best way to do it is to give your CSM unit the appropriate weapon for the job because:
1)CSM with plasma > horrors vs heavy infantry
2)CSM with missles > defiler vs vehicles
3)CSM with HB > anything else chaos has (with exception of cultists with grenade launchers if you can keep them alive) vs light infantry.
So I guess my point is Chaos support units that are specific counters to something are not as good as the upgraded basic unit vs their specific counter. Where in other races this isn't the case or the gap is not as big.

[ThE|Android]

As of right now, there is ONE... YES ONE Chaos player in the top 30 players on the 1v1 ladder.

okok i will be the second one in the top 30 players j/k or maybe not ^^

[Redcap224]

The initial poster was correct in with the typed observations for Chaos being weak in terms of no one is winning the higher Tiers with them.

Vertigo was correct, at least from my own personal experience from playing Chaos a lot, with all of his observations. His post summed up the same things I have been seeing.

As for Cultists sucking - yes, they do. I only bother to make 2 squads total of them and to be honest, I suicide / dance / throw them at my foe as a misdirection rather than spend points on grenade launchers half of the time. Let's face it - since cultists suck, why spend more Req on a bad thing? A heretic using Forced Labor can get your temple built FAST, so your commander and chaos marines are out lickity-split in comparison to other races busting out their better stuff. So... If cultists got a boost in HP's that would be great, but the way I play, I'd still not rely on them. I'd have better options through raptors and chaos marines over them.

As for Possessed, man, they are great, but as have been observed by Vertigo and others, Tier 3 really kinda sucks for Chaos. Others get better toys with better and cheaper options to get them. Chaos is all about taking the fight to the enemy NOW and reaching Tier 2 as fast as your mouse will let you click for it.

Which kinda bites, I guess. I still like them best for their graphics and sounds.

[.42.]

I like the idea of a blodthirster shooting Chaos Goo out of his eyes! To make it fair just make him 4 pop :P

You know what'd be cool for a chaos light vehicle?
Hells Angels! Chaos marines on Hogs that'd be so awsome.
I know they have them in TT.

Anyway Chaos is weak vs vehicles specially wartracks maybe a boost to rocket damage?

[Sajuur]

Chaos has been my ladder race for almost all ladder games I play. Their 10 squad number instead of 8 is very helpful, and the cultists are great for pulling enemies into CC, and keeping your CL alive. Cultists are often that little bit more than you need to win the first battle, and then you will probaly those both the squads so you can have 4 marine squads without any upgrades. I'm not a top player, but I've played over 75 automatch games since the beta, and Chaos was about the only race I ever use. They are weak at teir 3, but its rare for automatch to get there.

[[Vertigo]]

When I play chaos vs eldar or ork, I only tech to tier 2 for missles. Vs chaos and SM I tech to get plasma. All other their 2 and 3 chaos units are either not effective or too expensive to field properly. Teir one is where chaos is suppose to shine b/c of horros and psm, however even these units fall into the not effective (horrors) or too expensive (PSM in early game when they are most effictive) categories. It seems to me that the CSM units are suppose to be the main force of the army and all other units are suppose to be their support (just like SMs' army setup) however the other units are not well suited for supportment role because:
a) Are not a specific counter to anything but try to be buff on their own (PSM).
b) When you need to counter something the best way to do it is to give your CSM unit the appropriate weapon for the job because:
1)CSM with plasma > horrors vs heavy infantry
2)CSM with missles > defiler vs vehicles
3)CSM with HB > anything else chaos has (with exception of cultists with grenade launchers if you can keep them alive) vs light infantry.
So I guess my point is Chaos support units that are specific counters to something are not as good as the upgraded basic unit vs their specific counter. Where in other races this isn't the case or the gap is not as big.

That is exactly as I feel, I can't build anything else other than Chaos Space Marines. It is like CSMs are the only unit in our army. Plasma CSMs are better than Horrors for the price. CSMs with missles are our only anti-tank unit. CSMs with bolters are not as good as Cultist with grenade launchers so there is at least something else there. The biggest thing that is holding back Chaos, is the fact that the sac pit cost the same as the upgrade to teir 2.

[trekkie9090]

ok,why don't they leave cultists hp alone,and just make them 1 pop without heavy weapons and 2 pop if they have heavy weapons? No spare pop=no grenade launchers.

Also,the 2 pop cultists might be to balance the larger # of CSM in a tac squad,2 pop cultists=less tac squads.maybe

the Predator is extreamly weak.

No. It's a tier 3 unit that chaos gets at tier 2,it shouldn't wtfpwn everything.

Also,don't lower the PSM cost,thier annoying for me as ork,because they CC while CSM shoot up all my sluggas. Plus,they do wicked CC damage.

Make Defiler 2 pop? NO!!! God,10 of them would be insane they can do everything. Might as well make fire prism 2 pop too

[First And Only]

Because 1 pop cultists is overpowered. How will anyone have a unit free to shoot the cultists if the Chaos player has 1 pop cultists? Unelss you want them to die as fast as Grots do?

[*Eroes*]

That is exactly as I feel, I can't build anything else other than Chaos Space Marines. It is like CSMs are the only unit in our army. Plasma CSMs are better than Horrors for the price. CSMs with missles are our only anti-tank unit.

Yeah, and that is what I FEEL.

Chaos army is supposed to shine due to his units diversity. But we can't rely on that.
When I play against SM or Orks, my only anxiety is to tech fast fast fast to tier2 to gain missile launchers and defend against their wartraks and dreads [dreads: 3800hp, heavily armoured, good against anything ... cap2. Lol. Ridiculous].

Horrors, PSMs, Oblits ... I can't even think to build them: against 1400+ players I have to play in a very defensive way. So: CSMs and missile launchers, missile launchers and CSMs.

Answers to this problem?
Well, Aetherfox gave us and example.

Just my [probably useless] 2 cents

[{EG}Dark-Odin]

To Sanguinius_nz

Thats wierd cause everytime I go against banshess my possed wipe em out they lower there morale and with a damage rate of 103 to 126 I think when fully upgraded I just own a banshee unit and most of the time the eldar player runs em away back to his base and not to mention there is one ultimate thing Chaos have over the eldar my god this is the best thing of all

Eldar have 1 cloak detecting unit the farseer and what do you do, you draw the little blighter out kill it then send in 3-4 sqauds of Cm some armed with rockets and some with heavy bolters or you could just do all rockets then try to teleport your sorcere into there base so you can see there buildings if cloaked then let rip or you if you have an ally sm wait for him to send in his FC with DS always gets eldar they just curl up in a ball and die when they get hit with loads of rocket boys in the back of there base.

[-|EoT|-Havoc]

Space marines will just be better, because scouts just kick ass too much, they are the only 1 pop (combat)unit, are as fast as normal broken units, no terrain penalty, lots of firepower and can be equipped with 2 special weapons. When you mass scouts with flamers at the beginning, theres nothing chaos can do to stop them. Because cultists are worthless untill you get to grenade launchers, and after that they are useless again. But then again scouts will probably get a nerf in the new patch, because everyone knows they are too good to be 1 cap.

Defilers are supposed to fill the roles of dreadnought and artillery at the same time, but isnt really good at either of them.
Predators are not even a factor at tier 2, so basicly chaos has just one vehicle. And 1 vehicle hardly justifies the cost of a machine pit(not to mention the cap upgrade you have to buy at the beginning.
Just build sacrificial circle, PSM are quite good, and so is the sorcerer

Tier 3
I would not even go to tier 3 unless you have too much requisition. Because: oblits suck, your better off with CSM and possesed. Bloodthirster sucks->waaay too expensive for what he does. Only thing worth noticing in tier three is preds with lascannons.

So basicly, there are 2 ways to win with chaos imho
1. rush CSM with lord before he got his hero/units out. try to destroy as much as possible, retreat, and attack again immediatly when 2nd squad is out
2. tech to cultist grenade launchers asap, attack when you have them, then destroy him.

Do not let the game last into late tier2/tier3! You will not survive.

But instead of making it hard on yourself you could go play SM, would be alot easier. I just play chaos becuase everyone plays SM already

[Aner-Dyfan]

I play as both Chaos and Space Marine, not that I am a very good player with either. When I do play Chaos I can only win if it's a fairly short game, if the enemy has too many vehicles then I can't do it. Defillers are good for killing heavy infantry, but are useless if I am useing possessed marines cause they wipe out my morale and keep them from fighting. But if I just use tactical marines I'd rather be space marine, as then I can have healers, and a better range of vehicles.

Cultists could do with a bit of a Hp boost, though a tip is not to use them melee. I have fought scouts in melee and it's been a stalemate, moved them out of melee to range and then the scouts died in seconds. Defillers would also do better with a Hp boost, it's a bit unfair that dreads destroy them so easily even though they are less pop.

Chaos is VERY power hungry; possessed, horrors, lascannons. If the power generator was reduced in requisition then it might make it fairer, whenever I play Space marine I only ever need about half the generators. Even with quick-start I need a load of power plants for chaos, yet don't need any for other sides.

[*Eroes*]

So basicly, there are 2 ways to win with chaos imho
1. rush CSM with lord before he got his hero/units out. try to destroy as much as possible, retreat, and attack again immediatly when 2nd squad is out
2. tech to cultist grenade launchers asap, attack when you have them, then destroy him.

But instead of making it hard on yourself you could go play SM, would be alot easier. I just play chaos becuase everyone plays SM already

Indeed I'm using SM these days.

But this is a defeat.
Not for me. Not for you. But for the game itself.

As a 1420 rank. points player [now 1360, after a lot of defeats agains 1450+ Sm players], I find myself unable to go forward with Chaos army.
And not for my fault, but for the limits of this army.

[Redjowl]

One of the problems I find when playing as chaos is a lack of a clear path to victory.

What I mean by this is you get several options to spend your res on come tier two but neither is realy good enough on its own and its too expensive to go for both.

The other races can pretty much all go for armoury (or the racial equivalent) then Machine pit equivalent and start pumping vehicles.

Chaos however arent realy strong enough with just vehicles alone (whereas other races can) to win a battle. However if you go for the sac pit for the infantry to win the game you lack the anti vehicle firepower to stop someone who is concentrating on vehicles.

Going for both vehicles and sac pit isnt normally an option due to the cost of both.

Maybe an option, which would hopefully be keeping the theme of the game, would be to give chaos an extra unit type (deamon) from the sac pit. This unit could be something like blood letters or possibley jugganaughts (I apologise for the spelling its been a long time since i last read about either unit) and be an anti vehicle deamon unit.

This would make it possible for chaos to go for the sac pit rather than the machine pit (hopefully saving a bit on missles too) which would also add to the theme of chaos being a deamon based army, less reliant on vehicles than other races.

The new deamon unit could possibley use up vehicle cap rather than troop cap (as chaos already has some squad cap issues) and possibely should be fairly weak at attacking buildings to save it from being unbalancing in attack.

I think that even with this horrors need to be made into a more useful unit which might also add to the sac pit being the focus of chaos armies to save them being so similar to sm armies.

[RhyuFyre]

Lower the SAC PIT cost to 150 and 50. Its already costing a teir upgrade

[Sinbad]

Maybe an option, which would hopefully be keeping the theme of the game, would be to give chaos an extra unit type (deamon) from the sac pit. This unit could be something like blood letters or possibley jugganaughts (I apologise for the spelling its been a long time since i last read about either unit) and be an anti vehicle deamon unit.

I think this is a good idea. However I do not think it is going to happen in a patch though, it sounds more like something that would be done in an expansion. I am fine with the units that chaos has and their power/req costs. I would like to see some of these units buffed up a little bit so that I would actually have an incentive to build them.

[trekkie9090]

[dreads: 3800hp, heavily armoured, good against anything ... cap2. Lol. Ridiculous].

imho,defiler > dread. It just fills alot of roles so chaos can pump out 1 vehicle and do alot of things with just those 1 type, If u CC it will kill you,if u run it will autocannon you,if u get outta autocannon range or charger it ,it will usu its aty and decimate morale.Thats basically what the ork leman russ does,only the russ has more hp,no CC damage,and comes a tier later. To sum it up,leave it 3 pop.

[MusedMark]

Defilers are good, but they dont last long enough. In cc, while they can tie a sqaud it takes a defieler a very long time to actually kill the sqaud. Its cannon is good, but not brilliant.. And a chaos player has to spend 150 req just to able to get one out, on top of the cost of the defiler and the vehicle pit. The 150req could be better spent on re-inforcing units or what not.

The problem with Chaos, in my honest opinion, is that the sqauds are all too generic. No single unit or sqaud is a direct counter for an enemy sqaud/unit.
Let me elaborate....
Orks have a possible strat/bo for each race they may face
Eldar also have a strat/bo for each race they may face
SM to an extent can use one of many different early game builds to harass specific races.
CSM dont, not one early game chaos unit is a good counter to what the enemy can throw at you.
Anything a Chaos player can do a SM player can do better, an ork player can over run and an eldar player can counter.

Its not really fair when the best match up a Chaos player can hope for is Vs another chaos player.

Sure, there some good chaos players out there (myself included), but it like having to play with a handicap. I don't want any drastic balance altering changes for chaos, i just wanna see them get an easier ride through the game.
`

[ChRoNiC]

totally agree that chaos needs buffing...

my change list would be...

1. Cultists: More hp or slighly quicker reinforce time.

2. Sac pitt: make it quicker and cheaper to build.

3. PSM: Slightly quicker to build.

4. Horrors: need to be made cheaper to build or more effective for what they currently cost perhaps allow them to reinforce?

5. Chaos pred: main gun needs to do more damage this would stop chaos getting owned by tier 2 vehicles.

6. defillers: make them 2 pop!

[trekkie9090]

6. defillers: make them 2 pop!

no no no no and no!Defiler is to good for 2 pop,because of it's artilery. Not to pop,a chaos player with ten defilers would be to strong.

Alos, theres no way chaos could be buffed that much, chronic, and be balanced.Faster building PSM with cheaper sac pit= much more powerful rush.

[/QUOTE]5. Chaos pred: main gun needs to do more damage this would stop chaos getting owned by tier 2 vehicles. [QUOTE]

it's a tier 3 vehicle chaos get early,dont expect it to pwn everything,its fine.

But the most important one is don't change defiler pop!!!

[Albi]

Whirlwind pop 2
Dread pop 2
Landspeeder pop 2

WarTrak pop 2

Eldar fast thingy pop 2

@ trekkie9090 what would say is Chaos pop 2 veh?

None + they have to buy a Veh upgrade to get the first veh.

[FM_Surrigon]

I was primarily a chaos player (I've lost interest recently because it's just gotten too frustrating) and I played two types of games:

Games where I got out-played
and
Games where chaos got out-played

A decent gamer knows the difference. I get out-played a fair number of times, but there are times when an opponent just so non-chalantly decimates me that I know there wasn't much I could've done.

[[Vertigo]]

totally agree that chaos needs buffing...

my change list would be...

1. Cultists: More hp or slighly quicker reinforce time.

2. Sac pitt: make it quicker and cheaper to build.

3. PSM: Slightly quicker to build.

4. Horrors: need to be made cheaper to build or more effective for what they currently cost perhaps allow them to reinforce?

5. Chaos pred: main gun needs to do more damage this would stop chaos getting owned by tier 2 vehicles.

6. defillers: make them 2 pop!

I think Chronic sumed the ballance changes, that I would like to see, best. Except for the Defiler being 2 pop, that would be way too much for any game. Instead I would like to see the Chaos machine pit produce 3 vehicle cap instead of the 2 it currently produces.

[Chaz]

I love the Chaos for their style only. I've not played online since Gamespy hates me and most likely my router with an unbrideled passion, but I have gotten a chance to play rather often on the LAN at my friends'. I tend to play on Random because it adds some fun to it. The only time I choose a side, I always choose Chaos. Style baby.

While the Chaos have some advantages over the other races, ultimately the other races have far more advantages over the Chaos.

Defilers really do need a drop in cap to 2. As it stands currently, the defiler tries to be a multi-purpose assault walker but doesn't actually do anything well. Its artillery can break a squad up if it hits, sure. But it doesn't do enough damage to change the tide of a battle. In CC it'll tie a squad of troops up, but by that time the other player should already have MLs sitting behind that squad. More often than not those MLs can shred the defiler long before it kills off a squad in CC. Well, unless you're fighting orks. In which case there'll be a mass of squads with nob leaders just itching to use their power claws while a tank busta squad sits behind them slaughtering the big mechanical monster with rockets. Then a Killa Kan trundles out and laughs at the very thought of a Defiler harming it in CC. It is not good at everything, it can just do everything very poorly (especially considering it requires a vehicle cap increase in addition to the cost of the machine pit and defiler).

The Chaos Tier 3 is a desolate place full of expensive options that lead you nowhere. I've been toying around with a few ideas on how to make teching to Tier 3 worth more than a twin-linked Lascannon on the Pred. Oblits, while a very good fire support role need something more to be worth the cost of teching to tier 3 and then the insane amount of time it takes to reinforce. Perhaps a reduction in the reinforce time or an increase to six man squads. They are handy as it is, but they are still easy to counter (especially if the game has dragged on to Tier 3) and just lacking when compared to the cost/time needed for them. As for the bloodthirster...well..ha. Yeah right. Uber unit he is not. A ludicrious jaw-droppingly stupid waste of resources. While he has the element of surprise and can pop out of anywhere (well, anywhere an aspiring champion or CL happens to be), he is still just not up to snuff. A squad of Assault Terminators can crush the over-sized idiot by themselves. He needs a bit of tweaking, perhaps just a decrease in how fast his life plummets when he isn't swinging that huge axe. So what's left in Tier 3 now? Upgrades for the Sorcerer and CL. Corruption does barely noticeable amounts of damage and then there's some ability that I've never used for the CL. So, why as a Chaos player, should I even consider using the resources to tech to tier 3?

Cultists...well I just don't know what the hell can be done here. It seems they are weak, but any buff seems like it'd unbalance it in the cultist favor. Perhaps a simple and slight HP buff would do it, but I'm not sure.

The Sac pit could probably stand for a price decrease, as could the horrors. The only thing horrifying about those little imps is how useless they are and the fact that they come at the same cost as a squad of PSM.

The PSM are the icons of the Chaos army...or can be. Provided you are given the time and money it takes to pump out a squad of PSM, reinforce them, and then research all of their upgrades. About ten minutes later, yeah, you've got some insane little buggers running around.

Generally I end up just fielding a bunch of CSMs, a single squad of PSM with the CL and CS. Defilers serve as mechanical meat shields and the Pred rolls around being really ineffective until I can stick lascannons on it. If the game even lasts that long. Unfortunately by then I'm watching Dreadnaughts stomping around screaming "I shall end you" while fire prisms jump all over the place and blast my poor little CSMs into the hills.

I can win with the Chaos against my friends, but it feels like I had to work harder to do it; though at the same time it seems more satisfying to win with them.

"The forces of Chaos call for your destruction!"

[newghost]

here what my changes would be

1. buff the oblits. the assault cannonn and plasma cannon need a tiny buff, but i think that where the problem lies is with the units las cannon. buff it and up the penetration power of the cannon and plasma. if your gonna whine about that making oblits too powerful, just limit them to 4 like healer units.

2. add 40 or so HPs to cultist, this way theyre still meatshields, but they wouldnt be over powered later.

3. sac pit should be cheaper.

4. remove that lame idea of the BT loseing health every second, thats just stupid.

5. buff the preds cannons SLIGHTLY, like only 5 points. (for those of you who mod your games.)

since i REALLY doubt well see a chaos light vehicle soon, just give the Defiler a slight buff. other than that i dont see any other problems.

[Sps]

As an eldar player my thoughts at seeing vehicles rom chaos is quite literaly:

"Oh, it's just a defiler".

Whereas dreds whom yes I can dispose of relatively easy - are a pain. As chaos I used to love sending 3-4 defilers in cc to tear enemy a new one, but as people got better I'm usually trying to keep my precious few csm alive vs a horde of sm/ork by artying the approach and shooting anything getting close to the defiler. One dred can turn the tide of battle - one defiler capable yes, but not so much.

Why is this the case? Simple ,defiler is paperthin and as they say jack of all trades and master of none - almost.

Two solutions I can see for defiler:

1. Increase it's HP. Why? Well a lot of Sm players whine trying to keep their overpowered race as such but at 3 pop you have maximum of 6 units relatively ok as artilery and good as CC. Crap at ranged as autocanon I never even notice killing anything (and i am eldar go figure). Since no1 ever uses rhinos much that always leaves 18 vehicle pop vs 20 vehicle pop - 10 vs 6 - always.

2. Reduce cap to 2 (very dangerous)

At 20 cap sm can have 5 wicked good CC units and 5 relatively good arty units with insane range. That is TEN vehicles you have to dispose of as chaos.

Sm has to worry about 6 only and simply treat it as artilery - spread missile squads and keep them out of cc, defilers low HP makes it easy to pop them.

To any sane person this is a decisive Sm advantage and total vehicle superiority. Think about it:

5 dreds (more than a match for 6 defilers)
2 ww's
2 predators

vs?

6 chaos vehicles - any mix of defiler/predators (2-4, 1-5, 3-3, 4-2, 5-1)

Sm win the vehicle war every single time with one formula - arguably half the sm cap of 5 dreds is quite enough.

Solution:

Increase defilers HP
Increase autocannon damage output slightly
Keep it at 3 pop as its versatility justifies it - provided it does it slightly better.

I like chaos. I t is my second race altho I am not as good at it but frankly aside from possessed or an early raptor rush chaos is ZERO threat to my eldar.

Actually the beefs I have with chaos and buffs I think would make them able to stand up to SM are:

Increase cultist HP slightly
Increase chaos marines reinforcment speed slightly (they are after all about numbers)
Nerf horrors back but also make them 1 pop as they were at one point during beta (I think I could be hallucinating) and make them cost 220/50
Increase defiler HP
Reduce obliterators to 3 pop and increase their laz cannon damage.
Make chaos buildings actually benefit chaos and maybe even HURT enemy near them.

I am not suggesting ALL of these at same time but they are some ideas. 1.1 has definitely made chaos better but not enough.

Alternative train of thought I have is that chaos may be fine as is, SM are without a doubt in my mind the most overpowered race across the board. They do everything exceptionaly well and they do it at all points in the game. Even SM weapons are UBER as plasma mass is quite capable of taking down a defiler, not as fast as missiles but definitely capable. You try taking out a few dreds with a full eldar infantry cap and we'll see you in a decade or two. I could post a replay of my mass plasma scouts wtfpwning a kan but i am sure Sm players would consider it a rigged game :P

(yes i know eldar BL kills vehicles the point is SM weapons suffer almost no penalty if they happen to be the wrong ones - plasma will do vs eldar just as well as bolter the only shortcoming being range!)

The single biggest advantage of SM vs other races is time. They addapt fast and do so on the spot with minimal time penalty. Their basic units are resiliant enough to hold a lot of pressure until tier 2. I would be quite happy if my aspect portal cost 250 and required no aspect stone for banshees precisely because of the TIME factor.

Which is also why chaos only has advantage early on due to FL. VS chaos SM have a formidable enemy until mid tier 2 when vehicles start showing up in numbers. And at tier 3 chaos only has laz predator as obliterators are a joke (and this is from an eldar player).

I play a lot of team games with a team vs team skillset being relatively equal T3 is reached quite often, and 2v2v2's which always reach t3 - so I have a bit of a different perspective than a lot of automatchers.

But again while yes chaos could use some bufss, I think SM needs to be brought down to chaos level as opposed to the other way around.

[.42.]

SPS:
You probably don't know this since you say you mostly play team games
but chaos is being run over by fast wartracks in automatch so if you bring SM to chaos's level you will have 2 races underpowered vs orks. SM isn't doing that well vs fast wartracks either, so I bet we can expect wartracks to be toned down a bit in the next patch.

In any case I'd rather buff chaos rathen than nerf SM.

I like the idea of starting with 3 vehicle cap then we wouldn't have to pay through the nose for our first defiler or predator.

[silencio]

The likely reason that cultists are poor at the moment is that balance changes are usually made very gradually. In the final version of the beta before release, cultist squads formed part of a horribly effective tier 1 chaos rush due to the fact that their reinforce time was so fast they were almost impossible to kill without concentrated fire, and concentrating your fire meant losing to the csm.

I think that cultists now either need a slightly faster reinforce time, an increase to their HP or possibly a careful combination of the 2. I don't think dropping the cap to 1 is really the answer, and if you did I think you'd have to restrict the grenade launchers to 1 per squad until after the heavy weapons increase research.

[Shorn]

Not sure chaos should match SM in the vehicle war. SM are the vehicle race. They have the best and most vehicles. Chaos I think are the infantry race. If chaos needs to be improved I think we should look there.

[testthewest]

the problem with chaos and the lacking of diversity is the following (applys to SM too):
Space Marines are too good. In fact they are the best counter to everything and available from the start. Right now if a critical mass of Marines is reached, the only way to beat it is with more Marines. Here is where the advantge for SM over Chaos comes: Snipers force you to attack in their defences due to their high range/dmg.