GreaterChickenofTzeentch

I am certainly excited about running Havocs as if they were "Troops" and testing out my 2 new Defilers or running 3 Preds, 3 Vindis, and a Land Raider for an armored spearhead.

Basic, but fun: Warpsmith w/Mark of Tzeentch and Eye of Tzeentch, Tzeentch Havocs with Heavy Bolters, Slaanesh Vindicator: Slap the Vindicator on the rear with Master of Mechanisms, so that it can advance, shoot, and charge (using Unnatural Swiftness, being Slaanesh) with +1 to hit. Advance the Vindi, move the Havocs/Warpsmith up and open up with the Heavy Bolters on another unit, getting crits on 5's for both Sustained (native) and Lethal Hits (warpfire). Eye of Tzeentch likely gets you the CP for Unnatural Swiftness back. The Vindi, of course, opens fire, calling Sustained Hits with a 2+ and then yells "TANK SHOOOOOOCK!!" and charges to go bowling for Mortals.....then proceeds to sit there in combat, ramming and blasting things at pointblank range while the Havoc unit moves past it looking for other targets, maybe healing the Vindi if needed.

Stubbers and crazy missle-multi-tool stuff seem like Cawl trying to "AdMech-ify" the Primaris. The Desolator launchers look like that insane box launcher from the Onager Dunecrawler and AM use stubbers all over the place. I can see why they went there......but not a fan of how they chose to do it.

I agree with @techsoldaten. Why no Vindicator? The World Eaters were listed in past fluff as some of the biggest users of the tank among the Traitor Legions. Bizarre.

Nice that they finally explained who runs the Forge of Souls and makes all those Soulgrinder pacts. I imagine he'll have some interesting effects on them in particular.

Another way I've seen Havocs used successfully is to jam a squad or two in a Dreadclaw, drop them in and unload Chaincannons or Heavy Bolters. That's not quite what we're talking about, but maybe it could be adapted to Lascannons or Missile Launchers. On a related note, if using Iron Warriors, the Missile Launcher is an excellent weapon for Havocs specifically. Methodical Annihilation allows them to either smooth out the damage for Krak Missiles slightly by re-rolling one damage roll or max-out hilariously on frag missile shots. When you're already ignoring cover, either can be important. I could see that versatility being important against the new Guard. Firing 24 shots into Roughriders or maybe 12 into each of 2 Infantry Squads could be good. For Word Bearers, you could use a Khorne Apostle with Epistle of Lorgar to give Wrathful Entreaty to one Khorne Havoc Squad and keep them always in Wanton Destruction, while giving another Warp Sight Plea to reroll 1's and ignore cover. Then when the group of them are charged, they're re-rolling hit rolls and maybe taking a couple down with them. Hexagrammatic Ward might help with return fire in a pinch.

Yeah, in 3.5, this was the core of my friend's World Eaters army. 3 bike squads, a Lord on a bike, a character with the Daemon Chains to control when he would explode, a Bloodthirster to emerge from said explosion, and a pile of Bloodletters.

On the Havoc note, I've seen their durability issue helped by Rhinos in a few games. Start the Havocs in there, then move out and fire. If you want to run multiple squads, jam two in one Rhino and hide it behind another tank.

Traitor Guard, Corpse Grinder Cult, and the Slaughterbrute would be no-brainers,. They already have models, the Traitor Guard kit has some melee options unused in 40k, and as has been said, the Slaughterbrute shares a kit with the Vortex Beast. Wouldn't be perfect, but could create an interesting "human wave" army that also fits with favored Khorne tactics.

On the Librarians, they had no psychic powers and had just basically become "tallymen" somewhat similar to the Nurgle concept. Would have been interesting if they had kept that concept instead of having the last WE librarians dying trying to save Angron (if I remember right). That's definitely an early item we won't see again, though, because of that change......and yes, this does mean that they could want to eliminate WE Havocs in a similar way. I just hope they don't.

In reference to "always," I was reacting to this, specifically from your post: "Havocs have always been the second WE unit banned after Sorcerers." Did you basically mean that they were the second unit removed after they started banning things? The word "always" is what was causing the issue. I do agree that they haven't always been consistent in what the WA didn't have access to. Khorne also specifically loves guns, especially big ones, and sometimes rewards champions with strange firearms.

"Teeth of Khorne" as a proper name may not have existed, but World Eaters Devestators are described as the "teeth of the World Eaters" and as plunging into combat to take blood while firing their weapons. This is Rogue Trader-era and the stats for them are in the old Slaves to Darkness book. Pg.262. So no, they were not always banned.

Yeah.....looks like red Thousand Sons....too thin. Why bother taking away Havocs when Teeth of Khorne exist in the Lore? Why move Master of Executions to HQ? Why no Raptors or Warp Talons when some Khorne Daemonkin spinoffs of the WE rely on them for their central battle tactics? No Terminator Lord? Really? This sounds like some variety of playtest. We'll see. They COULD want to hammer the unit selection this bad, in a colossally ignorant move, but I don't think it likely.

The clear front runner is Iron Warriors because of all the damage mitigation they have, the ability to ignore cover, their improved ability to heal vehicles via Technovenomous Mechatendrils, and the possibility of rerolling damage rolls if needed. Runner up might be Word Bearers because of Mortal Wound resistance and the extra durability from Hexagrammatic Ward in a pinch, as well as the fact that it can carry many DAEMONKIN units.

The Apostle could have other uses in the list, and I'm basing this on more than one squad. "Lots of free Special Weapons" might actually lead to something interesting, and the WLT could be adding value every turn in that case. A horde list based on covering the table in Guardsmen, Legionaries, and Chosen might work. Benediction of Darkness is an Aura, and that could help add a little durability to multiple Guardsmen units at once. Alternately, you could use a Dark Commune so that Traitor Guardsmen around it reroll 1's to hit, give it the Icon of the Hydra Cult, and use Benediction of Darkness as an aura buff, followed by Prescience from the Mindwitch on a squad that doesn't get Cult Leader. Then run one Marine character with whatever WLT you want and another with Cult Leader. Then spam infantry.....half Guardsmen and half Chosen/Legionaries. You get a lot of board coverage, plus lots of mobile Special Weapons. Will it work? Dunno, but worth at least trying.