# Chaos Marauders, Best set up



## Whamhammer

Hey all, I'm soon to embark on a large horde style block of Chaos Marauders and i was just wondering what people think is the best set up. I was thinking of doing mine as Khorne or Nurgle worshipers with Flails.
Anyone have any suggestions, or past experience with whats worked the best for your marauders or on the other hand what kind has been the hardest to take down?

Cheers


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## Tim/Steve

I dont play WoC but if I did I think I would take my marauders with great weapons in 10*4 formation, so at least 40 models. I might throw more in if I had the points.
I'm not sure which mark I would prefer to take, not khorne or tzeentch (frenzy on Ld7 is not a good plan, and it would only increase your attacks from 31 to 41, which isnt that much). Nurgle is a decent plan since they have WS4, as is slaanesh since that gets rid of their biggest problems.

Overall I think i would take mark of slaanesh, just so that the unit doesnt run away if the general isnt around... a few artillery strikes and they'll be taking a panic check, and even with a re-roll Ld7 is not that great.


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## Dave T Hobbit

My experiences are:

Armour

Light Armour - 6+ save is not very good and enough S4 weapons that it is often irrelevant;

Shield - 6+ save is not very good and enough S4 weapons that it is often irrelevant; slightly better than LA if run with Hand Weapon an MoT;

Shield and Light Armour - 5+ save is not terrible but enough S4 weapons that it is often reduced to 6+

Overall, anything other than Shield and Light Armour protects fewer casualties than you could have bought with the points it cost.

Command

Champion - very expensive for 1 attack but can be useful to fend off challenges if you want to put a fragile character in the unit

Musician and Standard Bearer - extra CR is very useful

Weapons

Flail - Punchy on the first round but do nothing on subsequent rounds, so unless you break your opponent in the first round they are the least effective over the long term;

Great Weapons - unless you opponent kills them all first they hit like a train, so a large enough unit can perform well even against heavily armoured foes.

Marks

Never tried Khorne

Nurgle - the -1 to hit with shooting attacks makes some difference; -1 WS when attacking them makes little difference for most opponents.

Slaanesh - very useful if you regularly fight all Fear armies (e.g. Vampire Counts);

Tzeentch - on a large unit it is cheaper than armour and less vulnerable to Strength; works quite well on Hand Weapon and Shield Marauders.

My anecdotal best pick is Great Weapons as it produces a good number of kills each round.


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## Aramoro

Khorne Marauders with Flails is just rude, you're Immune to Psychology from Frenzy and you hit like a freight train. Giving up that I4 so that you're better in subsequent rounds just doesn't cut it for me, blend them early, blend them hard.


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## Sworn Radical

Don't even bother taking the light armour, since you''ll be going for flails and both hands will be required for those. So, no light armour & shield combination. Just flails.
Mark of Nurgle, Slaanesh or Khorne are all fun on marauders, the usefulness of the mark in question depending on whom you're facing on the battlefield.
Run at least a horde of 30 of them, 40 is better though.


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## olderplayer

The most common set up is great weapons with khorne or tzeentch, sometime nurgle. With units being steadfast and marauders often losing ACR to elite troops, you are looking at remaining steadfast and using the great weapons to do a lot of damage. Khorne is nice in increasing the number of effective attacks and avoiding panics but also needs to have characters to control for beign faited into failed charges with LD 7.

In 7th edition, first round combat mattered the most, so i used flails a lot. In 8th edition, the key is to be steadfast and sustain combat for an extended period of time, long enough to hold off, deplete, or kill something of value before the unit dies, and it often will die unless you run over 50 models or are facing skaven slaves. Great weapons provide the most sustained ability to wound but sacrifice the ability to boost armour saves with shields and parry saves. A mark of tzeentch is more reliable than shields if you fear shooting and magic reducing the unit and costs less on a points per model basis than shields for a very large unit of marauders. A mark of khorne avoids the risk of panics and maxes out the killing effectiveness due to the extra attacks in the front rank (at least for one turn) but risks premature charges and frenzy will often be lost after the first round of combat. Nurgle can cut down the amount of damage from BS shooting and occasionally will alter hit probabilities in combat, but seems to have less value in 8th edition than in 7th.


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## Inquisitor Aurelius

I've been wondering about this myself actually, "umm"ing and "ah"ing over which is better - MoT with shields or GWs. (As this is for a Tzeentch-themed army - my first for 8th - I've only been looking seriously at those two.) 

It seems to boil down to a matter of horses for courses, really, but if pressed I'd give the edge to the GWs. Now that you always get to hit back unless you're more or less wiped out, striking last doesn't hurt as much - though it does make champions utterly worthless. Math suggests that GW marauders will do better in combat, as the extra casualties GWs inflict more than make up for the ones that shields will absorb. This seems to hold true for everything from night goblins to Chosen.

Having said that, if you're after a tarpit you probably want shields. Parry might save you an extra 1-2 marauders per turn, which means you're slower to lose ranks, which means you're sticking around longer. If the general and BSB are in range, odds are pretty good that anything hitting a block of 50 MoT marauders with shields won't come back out any time soon. (As long as that "anything" isn't also 10 ranks deep, of course.)

Why haven't I looked at flails? Worst of both worlds, mate. Avoid them like the plague in any but the fringiest of circumstances.


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## Vaz

230pts for 41 S5 Attacks on Immune to Psychology Troops is naughty.

Yeah, they might lose a few to shooting, they might lose out on Combat Resolution, but when you can put an ItP horde with WS4 S5, not many enjoy attacking them, even if they lose the momentum after that - because 230pts to hold up some elite troops for one turn or more, and to cause a few casualties (S6+ Monstrous Infantry being a pain - Dragon Ogres, Ironguts, Ushabti, and Kroxigor being a Chaos Warriors Nightmare unit).


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## Inquisitor Aurelius

Your math's a bit off - 31 attacks, assuming 10x4. (And putting a champion in a GW unit is a bit of a waste; he'll get himself killed before he swings half the time.)

Still, though - scary.


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## The Son of Horus

I've found Marauders are sort of hit or miss. For what you pay, a unit of 20 with flails or great weapons will typically do quite well. 

I've found trying to actually give the marauders any survivability is sort of a waste--light armor and shields really aren't worth bringing. 

One thing to keep in mind is that Marauders aren't necessarily the "main combat unit" of the army. Warriors are-- the Marauders' role really is more of a meat wall-- they get stuck in against other cheap junk while the Warriors go do the real fighting, or they make themselves a nuisance and create a protracted combat in the center of the table that you can use to set up advantageous charges with your Warriors in subsequent turns. 

As far as command goes-- might as well bring full command. While the Champion is subject to the silly challenge rules, it's often better to have him accept a challenge and die horribly than lose several models-- rank bonus does matter for Marauders, after all, and that one round where only one model is physically removed from a big character can make a surprising difference.


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## LukeValantine

Hmm and everyone called me mad when the WoC book came out, and I suggested great weapons on marauders, who's laughing now slithis?


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## Majere613

I think with Marauders, it's not so much a question of the 'right' way to field them, as the right way to field them to achieve their goal.

For example, I use mine as a forlorn hope- they go in first, make as much of a mess as possible, and hopefully destroy a unit or two and throw the rest into confusion. To that end, I field 40 with Flails and the MoK, as well as Full Command. With 3 S5, WS 4 attacks, the Chieftain has an outside chance of bagging an enemy hero in a challenge and grabbing an underdog bonus. If the unit gets there intact, over 40 flail attacks are a worry for just about anything out there. In previous games, this unit has steamrollered a like-sized horde of DE Spearmen in one turn, a Hellpit Abomination, and all manner of other nasties. Being immune to Panic also means that enemy missile fire can only whittle the unit down, not drive it off, which is a big plus.

If you want a cheap tank unit, a column with shields and the MoT can be Steadfast with a 5+ parry for a relatively small outlay of points. Of course, a nearby BSB or General is a good idea to bolster that iffy Ld of 7.

I'm in two minds about Great Weapons. Whilst a Horde might work, I'd be inclined to suggest a Steadfast column again. There's plenty of units out there that can get Steadfast cheaply, but not many can be S5.

Finally, I wouldn't completely discount small units with no upgrades at all. Since WoC re-roll Panic, they can be used as a skirmish screen of sorts to cover your advance. A basic 40 point unit in two ranks is enough to Disrupt if it hits the flanks of the enemy, though you'd probably need at least 15 of them to be sure to have enough models left after combat to still do so. Engaging a weaker unit from the front with a Spawn and from the side with cheapo Marauders can sometimes yield a shock win for a very cheekily low number of points


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## Vaz

Inquisitor Aurelius said:


> Your math's a bit off - 31 attacks, assuming 10x4. (And putting a champion in a GW unit is a bit of a waste; he'll get himself killed before he swings half the time.)
> 
> Still, though - scary.


Don't forget frenzy .


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