# Fabius Bile?



## Johnny Genocide (Mar 4, 2008)

I'm thinking of including Fabius in my Emperor's Children army, along with Lucius as this army is going to be extremely fluffy and I'm not really fond of lash.

Does anybody have any experience with him as he looks good on paper but something just doesn't click with me and I think he'll just be a liability.


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## LordWaffles (Jan 15, 2008)

Short story? He's really bad.

Long story? He's not only bad but has no synergy with emperors children.

He's about the cost of a bog-standard flying prince, and for his price you get a chaos lord with:
T4 (insta-deathed)
No power weapon(Inexcusable)
A terrible gun(Three shots? Really?)
NO INVULNERABLE SAVES(What!?)
No wings, no psychic powers, no I6 lashing flying monstrous creature.

You'll run a few games where his lackluster performance doesn't outwardly make your force suffer, but you'll be noticeably weaker in all respects with his heavy price tag.


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## Gul Torgo (Mar 31, 2008)

To be frank, a Daemon Prince is such a remarkably great HQ for its price that it can be difficult to justify taking anything else, including special characters.

Of course, this can run counter to many players' fluff or concept of the army, (after all, DPs are pretty rare, so it can feel weird to have a pair of em running around in a 1500 pt game) so there are reasons not to take them, but they rank as one of the best HQs in the game.

In regards to Bile specifically, all my troops are Noise Marines, for which Enhanced Warriors does not apply, and when Vanilla CSM pale in comparison to cult squads, this is kind of a useless special rule.
He's very fragile. Feel no pain is really good for 1 wound models, but I much prefer an Inv save for expensive multi wound guys.
He sounds great in melee, 7 attacks on the charge with an instant death weapon, but the fact that it allows armor saves really neuters it.
His gun could be pretty damn good against big guys like Carnifexes and C'Tan, though.

It's really too bad, since the fluff for him is so great.


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## Johnny Genocide (Mar 4, 2008)

damn, i was honestly hoping that he would get better reviews. He has soo much potential, the list that i was building has 2 10 man enhanced marine squads and depending on the rolls i get for them i run fabius with one and lucius with the other. Otherwise they're going with CC noise marines.

And with my list I'm kinda trying to stay away from Demon Princes as it is based right after the Istvaan V massacre.


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## Sieg (Dec 3, 2007)

i think he could be cool with zerkers. But thats just for fun, not really competitive at all


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## DarKKKKK (Feb 22, 2008)

funny i was just randomly going through my chaos codex and was wondering about Fabius
i had the same thought you did, but after really looking at it with that gut feeling that something wasnt right
i had found pretty much everything bad that everyone else here has said so far
so not worth it


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## Black Crusader (Mar 17, 2008)

I've put him into a few lists and got mixed results. It really depends on what you roll for enhanced warriors. Rolling a 1 can really hurt. While rolling a six will hurt your opponent. I recommend you take a minimum of 10 CSM in a squad if you decide to use enhanced warriors. As for Fabius, not having invulnereable saves is enough to discourage most people from taking him. But having 5 strenght 5 attatcks, 6 on the charge with the ability to insta-kill the toughest of foes is to tempting for some. Personally I like him, but he can be a huge liability. Besides everyone plays a DP.


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## maddermax (May 12, 2008)

Well, as a character he's pretty poor, his special rules make him decent in certain situations, but quite simply he'll never be up to the standards of the other HQ choices for all round bad-assery. His saving grace is supposed to be his "Enhanced warriors", however, for their points each, and the chance to accidentally kill themselves, you end up paying as much as for the ones who survive as for a 'zerker and the KB are just plain better.


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## Et Spiritus Dorn (Aug 4, 2009)

I would like to point out that Fabius is a very... VERY different HQ style than the CSM HQ's usually offer. He is not meant to be the all mighty bamf on the battlefield. What Fabius does is allow you to run an alternative style of list that promotes the use of regular CSM's. He makes them great (my example is allowing you to have S10 power fists speaks volumes!)

As for Fabius himself, yeah, he's not a character killer. He's a "F*ck your couch squishy little troops" kina guy. The fact that he has FnP helps in this regard, and the inst death is the way you keep the other player's thinking "well crap, he's got a lot of attacks, and it only takes one to rip my character apart. That helps too.

I have play tested my Fabius list, and am currently building it. I find it amazing! No one see's it coming and using ignorance of the opponent is a great way to take the advantage. After all... Khorn zerker lists are a dime a dozen... but a truly unique list like Fabius is rare. (not to mention many people will think he has a power weapon, but if they don't ask... it's their fault )

Props man, Hope it works out for ya.


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## Someguy (Nov 19, 2007)

Et Spiritus Dorn said:


> (not to mention many people will think he has a power weapon, but if they don't ask... it's their fault )


Not really. It's not your opponent's job to know the rules for your army. You should tell them if they get an armour save and don't know about it. Failing to do that is not the most sporting thing to do - and this is me saying it. Anyway, hoping that your opponent gets the rules for your sub-par character wrong, thereby handing you an advantage, fails when he knows what he's doing.

Generally I find that the problem is the comparison between khorne berzerkers and enhanced csms. The zerkers just seem to be better in most ways. Cult troops do have some advantages, particularly that they can bring a couple of melta guns along, but their lower WS and initiative (when charging) makes a big difference in combat. Other cult troops, particularly plague marines, offer a lot of the other stuff the enhanced guys bring while being tougher, fearless etc.

The big thing really is the comparison with a daemon prince - with or without lash. One of those can jump an enemy squad and just kill it, which is something FB just can't do at all. You lose the tactical power of lash plus the combat power of the daemon prince and get a very average character instead. Since the enhanced warriors are not conspicuously better than anything you could take normally, there doesn't seem to be much gained to compensate for the loss in the character himself.


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## Winterous (Mar 30, 2009)

He's shit himself, but what he brings to your army is massive!

S5 Marines?
Almost as good as Berzerkers, and a bit cheaper!

S10 Power fist?
Great against vehicles!

Berzerk fury?
Well, not so great...

You can get S6 Marines too, which is SPINE SHATTERINGLY not that great, but they'll hurt Transports a lot.
Too bad they explode one at a time :\


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## Asmodeun (Apr 26, 2009)

Yeah, the str 10 powerfists are one of the biggest advantages that I can see. Pity you can't enhance chosen or havoks.


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## Et Spiritus Dorn (Aug 4, 2009)

Yeah, I should say I was in a particularly schemeing mood, and I want to clarify that I always tell people my stats on my characters and for that matter all of my units. I just usually wait for them to ask. I'm not a fan a stating before the game "Oh by the way this character has no defenses. I'll let them figure it out when he gets hit by a power fist and i simply say "good play" and pluck him from the ranks.

On the other note, I'm not saying Fabius is better by any means to any of the other characters Chaos Marines are offered... in fact I believe I said that he is NOT a great character based on what he does himself, but he allows for a different style of army than your everyday average cult lists.

that being said... I find his enhanced marines are more versatile than lets say Khorn Bezerkers for a few reasons. First being they don't need to get the charge to be effective. Second, they get S10 power fists compared to any other army's S8 (or S 9 zerker fists) This means those characters with T5 are instant deathed. After all of this it allows for a mark of whatever; so now you get those nice warriors with another attack, T5, I5, or a 5+ invuln. In my opinion they arn't AS good at any one thing that the cult troops specialize in... but they are just better at everything than normal marine or MEQ.

I also have found that a daemon prince is shot down before making to big a difference on the field. Even with wings it just can't survive a large volley of bolter fire.

Again... Fabius and his list is not meant to be necessarily better... it is meant to be something different. People who play chaos (myself included) are used to the idea of killy death HQ's. Fabius is good, not as good as other characters, but offers a support role. You will want another HQ out there to give you a good killy unit, and maybe a cult troop on the field, but he's not bad... just different.

all of this is just imo, so please don't take it as me saying you're all wrong. We all have opinions right


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## Winterous (Mar 30, 2009)

Et Spiritus Dorn said:


> Loooooong!


Good show, I'd definitely take MoS with them, take THAT loyalist Marines!


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## MaidenManiac (Oct 2, 2008)

Id say all in, or fold, nothing in between:

This means that either you only go for Bile'd CSMs as troops with some nifty flags (IoS if you want to keep some ancient Slaanesh-tied fluff with Bile), Bile himself and some support (as in elite+HS, not cult troopers), aka max out his potential bonuses 

Or you just skip him. He costs a lot of points, and if you only use his enhancement on 1 unit you could just have bought other cult troopers and a good HQ instead:wink:

Something like this:
Bile
10 Biled CSMs, 2 melta, Asp, PF, IoS
Rhino
10 Biled CSMs, 2 melta, Asp, PF, IoS
Rhino
10 Biled CSMs, 2 melta, Asp, PF, IoS
Rhino
9 Biled CSMs, Flamer, Asp, PF, IoS
Rhino
Vindicator w Daemonic Possession
Vindicator w Daemonic Possession
Defiler
1750ish pts


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## Someguy (Nov 19, 2007)

Good points here.

I think one of the main reasons to use Bile is so that your army isn't a carbon copy of every other damn chaos list out there, with 2 lash princes, some zerkers, some plague marines and some obliterators. It does let you do something different and that should be encouraged.


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## jesse (Sep 29, 2008)

Someguy said:


> Good points here.
> 
> I think one of the main reasons to use Bile is so that your army isn't a carbon copy of every other damn chaos list out there, with 2 lash princes, some zerkers, some plague marines and some obliterators. It does let you do something different and that should be encouraged.



thank you


ive used fabius sometimes, and he's pretty decent.


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## Skye (Oct 22, 2008)

I haven't seen you use him Jess...
Not the point.
Any character has potential (sadly yes, even Tycho) when used properly. When in the hands of the inexperienced he could just turn out to be a highly priced Buffalo Bill from hell. In the hands of say...Maiden Maniac, he could turn into a deadly opponent who generates deadly opponents.
I think I'll write a list with him if you don't mind Jess.


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## MaidenManiac (Oct 2, 2008)

Skye said:


> Any character has potential (sadly yes, even Tycho) when used properly. When in the hands of the inexperienced he could just turn out to be a highly priced Buffalo Bill from hell. In the hands of say...Maiden Maniac, he could turn into a deadly opponent who generates deadly opponents.


I must have done something good to deserve that:chuffed:


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## shaantitus (Aug 3, 2009)

Maiden Maniac Marines.
That has a good ring to it. 
The thing is it think you need to use him all the way or not at all. The force needs to based on enhanced or 'maiden maniac marines' to be effective. You may get a dud squad but with enough of them on the table the negative effects should be outweighed by the positives.


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## LordWaffles (Jan 15, 2008)

Asmodeun said:


> Yeah, the str 10 powerfists are one of the biggest advantages that I can see. Pity you can't enhance chosen or havoks.


Did they ever FAQ that? To me that seems slightly still up in the air. He says you can only use his ability on "Chaos space marines" so "Terminators" wouldn't count, but "Chosen Chaos Space Marines" or "Chaos Space Marine Havoks" seem to fit the bill decently enough.


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## Winterous (Mar 30, 2009)

LordWaffles said:


> Did they ever FAQ that? To me that seems slightly still up in the air. He says you can only use his ability on "Chaos space marines" so "Terminators" wouldn't count, but "Chosen Chaos Space Marines" or "Chaos Space Marine Havoks" seem to fit the bill decently enough.


He can only upgrade "Chaos Space Marine squads"
There is no unit in the codex specifically called that, but the closest thing is "Chaos Space Marines"
It's a fair assumption they ONLY meant that, doing Terminators would be brooooooooooken, a whole bunch of S10 fists? HELL YEAH!


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## Bloodcuddler of Khorne (Mar 22, 2010)

I think his point was that, while most don't have this little loop-hole, there are some things on the list that actually include the term "Chaos Space Marines" in the detailed army list in the back of the codex. Although oddly Havocs are just called "Chaos Havocs" so that wouldn't apply. What MIGHT apply, if we go with LordWaffle's interpretation are:

-"Chaos Space Marines"
-"Chosen Chaos Space Marines"
-"Possessed Chaos Space Marines"

Unless of course they did FAQ it. Right now I'm going with the safe assumption, that it only applies to the Troop version, but it's worth asking I think.


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## Winterous (Mar 30, 2009)

Bloodcuddler of Khorne said:


> I think his point was that, while most don't have this little loop-hole, there are some things on the list that actually include the term "Chaos Space Marines" in the detailed army list in the back of the codex. Although oddly Havocs are just called "Chaos Havocs" so that wouldn't apply. What MIGHT apply, if we go with LordWaffle's interpretation are:
> 
> -"Chaos Space Marines"
> -"Chosen Chaos Space Marines"
> ...


Hi there, that was a 10 month necro XD
Just remember to read the last post date, to avoid things like this happening


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## Bloodcuddler of Khorne (Mar 22, 2010)

Oh, whoops. I just stumbled onto it by Googleing "Fabius Bile"


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