Reviews: Wrath of Magnus

So November/December looks pretty exciting for Chaos Space Marine (CSM) players, with a new campaign book War Zone Fenris: Wrath of Magnus and a new codex supplement Traitor Legions. There is a lot of content floating around the interwebz at the moment about it all, so we will be focusing on breaking the updates into 2 review articles. The first off the ranks though is Wrath of Magnus as we have the most info on it. There is a staggering amount of content here, so grab yourself a drink and lets get into it!

Games Workshop

War Zone Fenris: Wrath of Magnus is the concluding part of the saga that began with War Zone Fenris: Curse of the Wulfen, in which the Thousand Sons return to Fenris to enact vengeance on the hated Space Wolves – led by their Daemon Primarch, Magnus the Red.

Thousand Sons Detachments

Any Chaos Space Marines detachment may a Thousand Sons Detachment. If they are, they gain the following:

• Restrictions:
• Cannot include any Unique Characters other than Ahriman and Magnus the Red.
• Units that can take the Mark of Tzeentch must do so.
• You can't take models with any other Mark of Chaos.
• All units that can take Veterans of the Long War (VotLW) must do so at no cost.
• Daemon Princes must be Daemons of Tzeentch.
• Psykers from the Detachment can choose to generate all of their powers from the Discipline of Tzeentch. This is the first change from standard CSM that we see. Currently there is a restriction of only allowing half of the powers to be rolled on the Tzeentch (or any other chaos god's) chart

• Blessing of Tzeentch: any unit with VotLW affected by a blessing has their invulnerable save improved by 1.
• This is obviously an awesome ability, but keeping in mind that models with the Mark of Tzeentch can never have an invulnerable save better than a 3++ this isn't as broken as some may initially think.
• Blood Feud: Any unit with VotLW reroll failed to hit rolls every round of close combat when attacking Space Wolves, however Space Wolves in gain Hatred (Thousand Sons).
• Thousand Sons at first glance don't look overly close combat orientated, and Space Wolves are, so at this early stage I think this may in fact be a "penalty" or "cost" rather than a buff, especially seeing as how they already have Hatred Marines due to the VotLW.
• Legacy of the Rubricae: Rubric Marines are troops instead of Elite Choices.
• This is an interesting one. It means you don't need to take a Sorcerer in your army to make Rubric Marines your troops. If you wanted a Cult of the Pyrae themed army you could potentially use a Warp Smith as your only HQ and still take Rubric as troops in a CAD. Handy...

Artefacts

Effectively as expected you can take either Thousand Sons or standard CSM Artefacts.

• Astral Grimoire (30 Points): At the beginning of the movement phase, pick a friendly infantry unit within 12" gains the Jump unit type.
• There could be some really interesting combos here. Upgrading a big unit of Terminators for 30 points to effectively have Jump Packs could be pretty cool.
• Seer's Bane (40 Points): A Daemon Weapon with the following profile: AP2, Force and Daemon Weapon. The roll to wound is Leadership vs Leadership (except against vehicles where you use regular strength). Use the targets normal Toughness vs the bearer's Leadership for the purposes of Instant Death.
• Being a Daemon Weapon can be a bit hit and miss, but with the Force Ability, AP2 and striking at Initiative, this could be pretty baller, and is my Favorite from the list
• Helm of the Third Eye (20 Points): The bearer and their unit can Overwatch even if they have Slow and Purposeful, and gives them BS2 Overwatch if they do not have S&P
• Staff of Arcane Compulsion (10 Points): S+2, AP4, Concussive, Force, Repelling Sweep: enemy units charging the bearer or his unit suffer a -2 penalty to their charge distance.
• This is pretty handy if you throw in charging through cover. As said earlier, traditionally Thousand Sons aren't really combat focused, if you can keep them out of combat with failed enemy charges... all the better
• Coruscator (20 Points): Ranged weapon: 12" range, S4, AP3, Pistol, Blast, Soul Blaze.
• Athenaean Scrolls (20 Points): On a successful psychic test, if two or more of the dice are the same number (eg. you roll 2 5's), the power can't be denied.
• This is massive! For its points I think this will be the Go-To Artefact for the Thousand Sons.

Warlord Traits

1. Arrogance of Aeons: Warlord gains Adamantium Will and can reroll a single dice when they Deny the Witch.
2. Undying Form: Warlord gains Eternal Warrior.
3. Aetherstride: Warlord and his unit are not slowed by difficult terrain and do not suffer the initiative penalty for charging through difficult terrain.
4. Lord of Forbidden Lore: Warlord knows an additional psychic power.
5. Walker of the Webway: Warlord and his unit gain Deep Strike. If they already had Deep Strike, they do not scatter when Deep Striking.
6. Lord of Flux: Enemy units within 12" of your Warlord treat all terrain, even open ground, as difficult terrain. Additionally, any enemy units that run, trubo-boost, move flat out or charge within that radius must take dangerous terrain tests.

Some cool Warlord Traits for the Thousand Sons. Lord of Forbidden Lore is the only real AWESOME ability here, a lot of cool useful ones, but nothing game breaking.

Discipline of Tzeentch

These are the same as in the Chaos Space Marines book (Tzeentch's Firestorm, Boon of Mutation, Doombolt and Breath of Chaos) with four additional new powers. At this stage however it looks like only Magnus can use the 4th on the list below.

• Siphon Magic: WC 1, Blessing that targets the Psyker. Anytime friendly psykers successfully manifest a power within 18" of the caster, he gets an extra Warp Charge die he can use in that phase.
• Baleful Devolution: WC 2, Focused Witchfire, 18", Strength 6, AP 2, Assault D6, 
• Transmogrify: to wound rolls of a 6 cause Instant Death. If a model is slain in this manner, they become a Chaos Spawn under the Tzeentch player's control.
• Treason of Tzeentch: WC 3, Malediction that allows the caster to take over an enemy unit and have them shoot as if they were one of your units in the shooting phase, counting as having held still. The unit then must take a pinning check.
• Gaze of Magnus: WC 5, Beam, 18", Strength D, AP 1, Assault 1, Soul Blaze.

Some pretty cool powers here, also combo'ing quite well with existing powers. Obviously the Gaze of Magnus is baller, Strength D as a Beam is awesome. But the real winner for me is the Treason of Tzeentch. If you have both a Cyclopia Cabal in your army this would in theory allow you to steal a unit multiple times to shoot as your own. Exact ruling on this would need to be confirmed, but looks quite powerful.

Armoury of the Thousand Sons

• Warpflame Weapons: Standard flamer weapons with one better AP
• Warpflamer is a S4 AP4 Flamer
• Heavy Warpflamer is a S5 AP3 Heavy Flamer
• Inferno Weapons: Standard AP3 Bolter weapons
• Inferno Combi-Bolter (S4 AP3 Combi-Bolter)
• Soulreaper Cannon. This is the Assault Cannon looking weapon: 24", S5, AP 3, Heavy 4, Rending.
• Hellfyre Missile Rack: 24", S8, AP 3, Heavy 2

Some cool weapon options here, but thankfully nothing game breaking.

Formations, Detachments and Special Rules

• Favoured of Tzeentch: This rule looks awesome at first glance, allowing the formation to reroll all failed saving throws of a 1, not invulns, saving throws. Termis getting a 2+ rerollable, etc. The downside though is you need to take the maximum number of units in the given formation. You will very rarely see this actually in use.
• Thousand Sons Grand Coven: This is the Thousand Sons Compound Detachment or Formation Based Detachment. It has a cheap Core choice (550 points minimum) and then some solid Command and Auxiliary choices. Some of the cool command benefits include:
• Psykers can re-roll their perils results.
• Psykers can cast 1 additional power beyond their mastery level.

• War Cabal (Core): This is a staple for the Thousand Sons in my opinion, it is relatively cheap to get.
• Has the Favoured of Tzeentch rule (useless due to its requiring too many expensive units).
• If you succesfully manisfest a power in a Cabal unit then the unit reroll's all 1's to hit until the start of the next psychic phase.
• Sekhmet Conclave (Core):This I can't see getting much use due to it requiring 3 units of terminators minimum.
• Units get +1T when within 6" of 2 other units from the formation. So keeping all 3 units together makes them a pretty tough unit to crack.

• Reharti War Sect (Command): Pretty cool
• Psykers from this formation within 18" of Magnus harness on a 3+
• All psykers in this formation have line of sight to everything on the table (range still measured as normal)
• Ahriman's Exiles (Command): This is an awesome formation, giving you solid access to Exalted Sorcerers and Ahriman.
• Models within 18" harness powers on a 3+
• War Coven (Auxiliary): This formation is not quite as hot as Ahiman's Exiles as you have to pick a single Discipline instead of just any psychic power, but as it allows for regular Sorcs you can get away with this a lot cheaper than Ahriman's Exiles as well as it taking up a mandatory Auxiliary choice.
• The Coven pick 1 Psychic Discipline and harness powers on a 3+ from that Discipline only.
• Tazzngor Wargerd (Auxiliary): This is a solid choice for a Thousand Sons army. Giving you access to a horde of models that put a lot of forward pressure on the army.
• Tzangor units are able to run and charge in the same turn. Add in the Astral Grimoire (making them jump infantry) and this is a solid choice.
• Get +1S and +1I if they roll a 9 or greater on the charge distance.
• One of the cheapest formation to activate the Favoured of Tzeentch rule.

Updated or New Units

• Ahriman (230 Points): At the same price as before, he now has access to the powers he should have always had. He still doesn't have access to a Spell Familiar, so Exalted Sorcerers may be the way to go instead. But Ahiman's main 2 changes are:
• He now knows nearly every school of psychic power: Biomancy, Daemonology (Malefic), Divination, Ectomancy, Geomortis, Heretech, Pyromancy, Sinistrum, Telekensis, Telepathy and Tzeentch.
• He can take a Disc of Tzeentch (30 Points) for +1 attack and changing his unit type to Jetbike, which gives him mobility, but at 30 points that makes him quite expensive.

• Exalted Sorcerer (HQ) (160 Points): This guy is pretty bad ass. He starts out at Mastery Level 2, and can go up to Mastery Level 3 for the standard 25pts. He comes stock with the Mark of Tzeetch (so that is saving you 15 points there) and can use all of the same powers as Ahriman. Standard access to Chaos Rewards and Artefacts which will get you your Spell Familiar or any of the cool new artefacts. Once per game he can use his Lord of the Silver Tower ability similar to a Chapter Master. It is range: Unlimited, S9, AP 2, Heavy 1, Blast, Lance. He has the same stats as a Sorc with the following differences; +1BS, +1W, +1I and gains Fearless

• Tzaangors (TROOPS) (70 Points): Pretty much strait from Age of Sigmar. Tzeentch armies can be very light on models, and that is where Tzaangors come in. With a Guardsman statline but WS4 and T4, they're not bad. They come with a 6++ save. They come stock with either 2 close combat weapons, or with an Autopistol and Chainsword. One of them can be upgraded to a Twistbray (Champion).
• Thousand Sons armies are quite expensive and usually low model count, and at 70pts for the unit of 10, and the ability to go up to units of 30, these guys are a solid choice for a troops slot.

• Rubric Marines (150 Points): Not much has changed about these guys, however, they can take Warpflamers on any model.  You can only take 1 Soulreaper cannon per 10 models.
• These guys are still too expensive for my liking, however they can easily get a 3++ by just casting a single blessing of any kind on them.
• Their are some new formations allowing you to reroll 1's, so they become VERY durable if taken in these formations, however to gain these buffs you need too many units, so adds up points wise pretty quickly.

• Scarab Occult Terminators (250 Points): These models are absolutely awesome, but you will likely be scared off by their points level. 250 base for 5, including the sorcerer, and another 40pts per additional Terminator. They have normal Terminator stats but with a Power Sword on each model. They don't have Slow and Purposeful like the Rubric Marines, and they do come with AP3 Combi-Bolters. The Sorcerer/Champion is Mastery Level 2 with a stack of psychic disciplines to choose from and +1W. The unit can take a Heavy Warpflamer or Soulreaper Cannon per 5 Terminators and can also take a Hellfyre Missile Rack per 5 (so two heavy weapons in a unit of 5).
• In their formations (3-9 Units of Scarab Occult Terminators) they gain reroll 1's as well as +1 Toughness (the additional buff appears to only be when there are 9 units taken, still to be confirmed). Obviously they become significantly resilient, with a base 4++, easily buffed to a 3++, again rerolling 1's, they become super tough. But that takes a lot of points to pull off.
• While the formations solve the durability issues, the Scarab Occult Terminators also don't hit super hard. AP3 Combi-Bolters are great, but if their target unit is in cover or 2+ armor, you aren't really receiving a benefit over regular termis. And with a Strength 4 Power Sword you are seriously lacking the combat punch. The AP3 Heavy Flamer is a solid choice of course, but unfortunately just not enough.

• Magnus the Red: This is what everyone has been so excited to see, and for good reason! Ever since we saw the Primarch's in 30k we have been waiting for the Primarchs to the enter the timeline of Warhammer 40,000. He's got an impressive stat-line, however, despite him being massive, he's not a Gargantuan Creature, but is as expected a Flying Monstrous Creature. Has a solid statline as above. He also weighs in at 650pts, so not cheap. He's got a huge amounr of special rules: Adamantium Will, Daemon of Tzeentch, Deep Strike, Eternal Warrior, Fearless, Fleet, It Will Not Die, Veterans of the Long War
• Mastery level 5 - First of his kind
• Unearthly Power: harnesses Warp Charge on a 2+
• The Lord of Flux Warlord Trait
• Omniscient Eye: Magnus has Line of Sighth (LoS) to every model on the table when determining the targets of his psychic powers.
• Knows the Gaze of Magnus ability and all of the Tzeentch and Change powers. This is his biggest weakness as the powers he has access to are more limited. Gaze of Magnus will be the go to in most cases, but summoning in more units is always awesome, and a second option for a D shot isn't bad, either.
• The Blade of Magnus is Strength user (so 8), AP 2, Force, Soul Blaze and Transmogrify (which can turn models into Chaos Spawn).
• The Crown of Crimson Kings gives Magnus a 4++ and lets him ignore Perils of the Warp
• What a beast! With a blessing on him, he's rocking a 3++ rerolling 1's due to his Daemon of Tzeentch special rule. He is highly mobile, can see everything on the table for psychic powers, and generates and harnesses Warp Charge like a boss. Is he worth 650pts compared to other units you can take for those points? probably not, but that will depend on the player and list. I don't think you will go wrong if you decide to put him in your list.

Chaos Daemons

Chaos Space Marines are not the only one getting some love in the Wrath of Magnus, Chaos Daemons have their own section in the book, lets take a look

• Warp Storm of Tzeentch: If your warlord is a Daemon of Tzeentch and your primary detachment is either from the Chaos Daemons Codex, Curse of the Wulfen or Wrath of Magnus you can use the below Warp Storm table instead of the standard.
1. N/A
2. Choose at random one non-daemon Character. This character suffers D3 Wounds without saves of any kind. If slain, create a Chaos Spawn
3. If any psyker manifest a power, they have to roll on the perils table with any double result
4. Choose at random one Daemon of Tzeentch Character. Remove it from play. Return him to the battlefield via DS.
5. All psykers manifest powers on3+
6. All flamer weapons gain the warpflame SR
7. Each player may reroll up to 1D3 dice until end of turn. Each player rolls the D3 separately.
8. Psychic power cost is reduce by 1WC (to a minimum of 1). If a psyker fails to manifest a power, roll on the perils table.
9. Roll a D6 for every unit on the battlefield. With a result of 1 or 2, D6 hits, S4, AP4, Warpflame
10. Via DS, deploy a unit of 10 Brimstone horrors
11. Choose at random a non-Daemon of Tzeentch Character. Check LD. If failed, model is removed from play, replaced by a Herald of Tzeentch
12. Choose a Daemon of Tzeentch Character. Check Ld. If failed, model is removed from play. If passed, model is replaced by a Lord of Change.
• Pink Horrors (TROOPS) (90 Points): It is hard to say so early, however you will see a lot of the "Sky is Falling" comments around Pink Horrors with this update, and they may be justified... They have gained a ridiculously powerful ability
• Split: Split is a new special rule that brings an old rule back into the game. At the end of a phase, you get a unit of 2 Blue Horrors per Pink Horror killed (PER PHASE). These Blue Horrors can either be added to an existing unit making it larger, or alternatively create a new unit. These then morph into a base of 2 Brimstone Horrors in the same way. All of these units are Psykers, Daemons of Tzeentch (with a 5++, rerolling 1's), can Deep Strike, etc. One of the biggest complaints so far is that for a 90 point unit of Pink Horrors it gives you 250 points of units over the course of the game. 10 Pink Horrors (90pts) turn into 20 Blue Horrors (2x50pts) which in turn goes into 20 Brimstone Horrors (2x30pts) which can be spread out over easily a dozen units. These units can all contribute warp charge and are all able to also summon in other units.
• Blue Horrors (TROOPS) (50 Points): Just link Pink Horrors, but cheaper. They're Toughness and Strength 2, but psykers and great back field units. They give you everything Pink Horrors do at nearly half the price. They'd be an auto-include troop if it weren't for the fact that there's an even MORE efficient choice coming right up!

• Brimstone Horrors (TROOPS) (30 Points): Say hello to the best troop in the game! If it weren't for the fact that units of Pink and Blue Horrors create it, these little buggers on their own merit would be king. For a low low price of 30pts you get a troops choice that Deep Strikes, has Objective Secured in a CAD, has a 5++ (rerolling 1's), is a Psyker and can be taken in units of up to 20, 2 wound models. They are only T1, but they generate Warp Charge, have an invul and come stock with 20 wounds. Pretty much everything that shoots at it will chew through these guys. For 30pts this unit over-performs by a mile. At such a low hight as well you will find these guys will be easy to hide.

So why is the sky falling? The issue here is that a single troops choice can spawn double digit units, all of which are psykers, all of which can summon, all of which are reasonably durable, all of which are troops, can score objectives, shoot units, for next to no points. If you take 6 units of Pink Horrors you will end up with a total of 1,500 points of units waiting to spawn onto the tabletop (before amplifying that output via the Loci!). If you shoot a unit but don't kill it, you spawn legions of more units. Only time will tell, but expect to see a lot of head scratching as people struggle to work out how to deal with these guys.

Daemonic Loci of Tzeentch

• Lesser Locus of Transmogrification: Causes auto-hits on units as Horrors are killed: strength 3 hit for Pinks, 2 for Blues, 1 for Brimstones.
• Lesser Locus of Metamorphosis: The bearer and its unit have It Will Not Die.
• Great Locus of Change: Roll a D6 each, the bearer of the Loci and models in its unit substitute this number for their strength.
• Greater Locus of Trickery: Roll a D6 each turn. When enemy units target the bearer of this Loci or its unit and roll the same number count as a 1 instead.
• Exalted Locus of Conjuration: This model and all models in its unit add 1 to the Strength of all hits caused by psychic powers they manifest.
• Exalted Locus of Creation: Each time a Pink Horror in the bearer of the Loci's unit dies, it creates 4 Blue Horrors instead of two. Blue Horrors subsequently split into two Brimstone Horrors.

So, yeah. You take a few units of 20 Pink Horrors with the Exalted Locus of Creation and they can spawn 80 Blue Horrors, each. These in turn can spawn 80 Brimstone Horrors. These can all appear in a staggering number of units, each of whom are a psyker. Tzeentch Daemons look like they are getting a massive boost in the Troops department.