Runnin' with the Devil...a Counts as Story (part one)

Hi there! To start off I’d like to provide a little background on my Games-Workshop experience:

•I’ve played 40k since the advent of 3rd edition and have played every army that isn’t full of giant bugs or scary skeleton robots;
•As far as fantasy goes I remember when High Elf Dragon Princes rode around on actual Dragons (shocking eh!).

Needless to say I’ve been around long enough to see a lot of changes in the hobby and I consider myself flexible enough to roll with the trends (I’ve never yelled at anyone to get off my lawn, honest!). Despite what I hope is a reasonably open mind I have noticed a trend that I really dislike, the now common practice of using different codex’s to represent armies that players currently own.

Now before you start prepping the torches, pitchforks, and K3isha albums (oh the humanity!) for a good ol’ fashion lynching let me clarify a few things. I like (bolded for emphasis!) a lot of counts as army ideas. It’s a great way to add character to an army, develop new hobby skills and also allows people to diversify their collection; however, I seriously dislike people who are only in it because it allows them to use rules, units, etc… that do nothing but give the player a competitive edge not contained within their current rulebook.

By now everyone who regularly visits 40k websites and blogs will have seen this trend, with the most common examples being the legions of 40k Chaos players (see what I did there?) seeing the Emperor’s light and converting to Space Wolfism (or is that Russism?). I sympathize with Chaos players that read the Space Wolf codex and see more character then their own Chaos book could ever provide (damn you Gave Thorpe!!!) but I also start to see red when my opponent throws down 30 Grey Hunters, 5 Razorbacks, 15 Long Fangs and 4 Rune Priests and proclaims “This is my Word Bearer’s counts as army, glory to the Imperiu…er Chaos Gods”!

Now I know I mentioned five minutes ago that I’m typically a fan of counts as armies but the above example is not (in my opinion) a counts as army that fits within the spirit of the hobby. Counts as armies should (again in my opinion) still adhere to the fluff and canon set forth by our GW Overlords. This is what truly separates (for the third time this is just my opinion, quit shouting!) counts as armies that people can accept and appreciate from the all too common counts as abominations we see today.

Now I know everyone plays this game for different reasons, some to have fun, others to win and I can see both sides of that coin. That being said I would like counts as players to ask themselves:

•“Does this counts as project make sense?”
•“Is it fun for me and my opponent?”
•“Does it add something unique and interesting to the hobby?”
•“What would thrice damned Gav say?” <----just kidding, who cares what that clown thinks!

If people actually read this far (sorry Mom you don’t count) and are curious as to what I would consider a suitable counts as army then be sure to check in next week for Part Two!

P.S. This article is in no way solely directed at M. Kerr, hmmm too obvious, let’s call him Matt K.

I think if the models adequately represent their counter part then things should be fine. GW and the enourmous world they created for us geeks in the 41 millenium has (in my opinion) opened the flood gates for creativity and making your own fluff.

Now, I do see where you, or others ,would have issue with a 'counts as' where you take the fluff from one codex and apply it to another codex. That is where things DO start to get sketchy. But at the same time: "if the model represents"

To the space wolves counts as word bearers, I too saw that article on BellofLostSouls. And that is an army i don't agree with. I don't mind the horsemen as bikes. I do mind the fantasy Treekin used as Scouts with the one with a "yellow hand" the melta gunner. Seriously, a yellow hand counts as a melta gun? (That reminds me of Stash (oops, named a name) and his Imperial guard army with all the special weapons guys carrying flamers, but the nozzle's were painted different colours to represent melta, plasma, flamer. lol). And transferring Word Bearers fluff to a "razorspam" army makes me laugh.

I don't have a problem with Matt K's counts as space wolves, however I'm against counts as armies completely, unless it's completely obvious what is what, and that requires significant hobby skills, to put it bluntly - if you aren't a master at doing conversions who can back it up with some golden demon talent painting consider selling your army, and investing in the codex you want to play.

Here's a counts as army I would be humbled to play against... not just because it's got the only 2 armies I own rolled into 1... but also that too:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/271328.page Thanks Reagan, if you hadn't found this I never would have seen it.

System Commander wrote:I just cant wait to see the army that someone contructs which is filled with Blood Angel models, but using the Chaos codex for rules!

And I think that is exactly one of Mike's main points. That will never happen, because the other books (SW, BA, and now DA and BT) are just better than the Chaos book right now.

I was defo surprised to see the counts as necrons orks, but if you read further on he makes a point to say "I play solely for fun and not to win."

I still see the crossover marine usages as using a better book for a personnal preference of army or fluff.

Ryan, playing necrons is fun and rewarding, kinda like how getting your lunch money stolen at school was fun and rewarding. Ya I definitely would have gone for the all robot theme but made them necrons counts as orks... or you know they look like necrons, even though they're orks and then have it turn out, yup orks. Because it's nice to hand someone a beat down with a super nice army.


I think I'm less bothered by people making their worthless marines counts as other worthless marines because I don't play a marine army anymore, they all look alike you know. Reminds me of an old ork saying, "You make one humee go krump, you want to make the rest go krump too!"

The whole counts as thingy in games is one that I find impossible for me to pass a sweeping judgement on. Sometimes the counts as stuff for armies display a lot of creativity, effort, and general cleverness that really adds to the enjoyment of the hobby. That Necork army looks pretty cool.

Sometimes counts as is just an excuse to justify laziness, cheapness, and general contempt for the spirit of the hobby that sucks any potential enjoyment from a couple hours of gaming. I've found it impossible in the past when I was doing the warhammer league to come up with any rule either for or against it which means it is all down to the discretion of the hobbyist. Which often means you see =I=censor=I= stuff on the table. Memories for me of counts as awfulness are an entire army of goblins counting as dark elves which was about the dumbest stretch of GW fluff I could think of. I'd say I hate seeing toys being pushed around on the table but I've seen too many cool ork trucks for me to believe that.

I like seeing counts as stuff when it's done all cool like. It's too subjective to govern from a rules standpoint in a league unless you just get rid of the option, which I think is a loss. I reccomend snapping pic's of offending mini's and posting them on the forums for everyone to gather around and point and throw eRocks at the people doing it.

Because of this very argument is the resign why I didn't try and incorporate my Blood Raven army as Space Wolves. Even tho I thought of cool names for Space Wolf rules, eg Grey knights - Red knights, Wolfen - Blood rage, or Wolf tooth - Raven Claw. And I could go on. But explaining this to my opponent at the start of the game could be a hassle and just start bad vibes before the game. I also got used to Sternguard and Thunderfire cannons and are unwilling to part... (Dam old farmer attitude... lol). But since we are on the topic i am building some sweet ass sternguard form scratch, (left over bits... aka way cheaper), and they look sweet. I don't think this is stepping on any toes.
I to have no problem with the way Matt k did up his army. From what I can see he at least put some effort into it. But i am with Scott when it comes to putting toys on the table. Or at least put some effort into it. And represent the points.

Well I should probably chime in here with my counts as defense. I chose to use the space wolf codex to represent my word bearers because in my opinion it does the best job of fluffily doing justice to my legion. The command group(Dark Apostle/Coryphaus/First Acolyte) are the key components of my legion and sadly the chaos codex does a very poor job of that and even worse I in fact have to counts as just to make this poor representation(chaos lord w/ mark of tz to represent rosarius save and nothing to represent the other chaplain abilities). This command group, possessed, chosen, cultists, lone wolves, and the AtSKnF special rule. All of which I will justify momentarily.

Coryphaus: Military commander of the host
- This is the only HQ choice that the chaos dex can adaquetly represent via the chaos lord, fortunately the wolf dex also contains a choice in the wolf lord that is able to do the same thing. Therefore this choice is a wash

Dark Apostle: Fallen chaplain
- The Dark Apostle is suppose to be the spiritual leader of the host and as such is more of a support character. As stated the chaos lord needs to be counts as just to achieve a poor representation of this unit. The space wolf dex has wolf priests which are a perfect rep of this guy. Wolf dex +1

First Acolyte: the little guy
- He is the dark apostle's apprentice. As you could probably guess if the chaos lord is a poor rep at best of dark apostle then it is even worse at this guy. Space wolves have the wolf guard battle leader, an aspiring leader, is a very effective way of representing the word bearers aspiring leader. Wolf Dex +1

Chosen
- In the fluff chosen are suppose to represent a collection of aspiring champions who fight together. Unfortunately the chaos dex makes them no better than chaos marines. The wolf dex allows this mechanic with the ability to break down into leaders of individual squads in exactly the way that they are suppose to. Wolf Dex +1

Cultists
- Aspide from Alpha legion Word bearers are the most active legion in the department of cultists. Within the chaos codex the only way to represent this counts as lesser demons. The wolf dex allows me to represent highly trained enhanced cultists with access to actual cultist like wargear and being led by an aspiring champion. Both require counts as but wolf dex is a smaller stretch of counts as and results in a better representation of what i believe cultists should be. Wolf Dex +1

Lone Wolf
- Burias-Draskull: a possessed icon bearer from the WB books who sometimes goes off on his own and wreaks havoc independantly of the retinue he is attached to. I really like this character but in the chaos codex again no way to represent him. Wolf dex has the lone wolf, basically a perfect way to represent how this guy functions. Wolf Dex +1

ATSKNF(And they shall know no fear)
- Word Bearers are religious fanatics. There is no way within the chaos codex of representing this faith in the chaos gods. Space wolves contain this special rule designed to represent their devotion to the emperor, a stretch to it representing devotion to other gods I dont find to be a big stretch. This is something i have recently started thinking about and as such my arguement is not as well thought out as I would like therefore lets call this one a wash.

Possessed Marines
- Word Bearers contained the first possessed of the chaos legions generally distributed throughout the different squads. I know what you are going to say "but Matt the chaos dex has possessed." I'm not going to beat around the bush the unit is terrible. The reason I like the wolf dex for this is half for that reason and half because WB possessed often operate within their old squads. Wolf dex MoTW does this mechanic well. Both contain different ways of representing this unit so I'm going to call it a wash

In conclusion I think that I have demonstrated and justified my opinion that the Space Wolf dex does a better job of representing my specific legion than the Chaos Marine dex. I wont deny that I think that Space wolves are a more powerful dex however i think it is completely unreasonable to think I should hamstring myself and use a book that in no way represents the character of my legion just becase it does no say chaos on the front cover.

A few people have mentioned Goatboy before and I would like to point out imo what I do bears no repsemblance to his counts as thingy. He has created his space goats with the intention of being able to use them with every new marine dex that comes out. I on the other hand have used the wolf dex almost exclusively since its release save 1 maybe 2 times with the chaos dex. If anyone is unclear or disagrees with any of my points please feel free to post up and I will be more than happy to flesh out or further explain my position

That's pretty self-centered to think that anyone was talking about you matt. Stop thinking you're everyone's world center!

Clearly I'm only the center of your world Greg. Sheesh even your avatar is a picture of me...creepy

kerr_matt80 wrote:Clearly I'm only the center of your world Greg. Sheesh even your avatar is a picture of me...creepy

After seeing this comment while eating breakfast, I almost choked because I was laughing to hard... Thanks for endanger my life.... lol

Ah Matt...I even put in a line that specifically states that this article isn't directed entirely at you but you decide to pipe in and almost single handedly prove my point. Let’s break down your arguments one by one:

Chaos Lord: I agree that Wolf Lord’s are tubbier then any HQ choice the Chaos Codex can produce and that probably sucks when you're trying to create a badass HQ to base your army off of. The issue is you take a Wolf Lord on a Thunderwolf mount. How does this choice represent Word Bearer fluff?

Dark Apostles: In all my games against you and all the games I've seen you play you have never had a Wolf Priest in your army. In fact you always use a Rune Priest, apparently a shamanistic psyker who masters the elements is Word Bearer's canon (or maybe it’s just the fact that Rune Priests are really good).

I'll give you the Chosen because I agree 100% that Wolfguard better represent an elite cadre of Chaos veterans better than anything you could do using the actual codex.

Cultists: What on earth is contained in the Wolf codex that lets you represent Chaos Cultists?? If you're talking about Grey Hunters (who would represent…I don't know maybe Space Marines...) I think it’s obvious you've just lost your mind

ATSKNF: This is where you're argument really starts losing steam. The Chaos codex provides approximately 6 choices (5 are troops) that have the Fearless USR. Undivided Icons give you a re-roll on Ld 10 for any Morale/Pinning checks. You're trying to tell me that lower leadership models who rally out of loyalty to their brethren (i.e. Space Wolf units) better represent the fanaticism of Word Bearer's? Fanatics won't make a sneaky fallback to avoid getting killed (i.e. Imperial Marines), they'll stand there and die (i.e. fearless units) or run back to the Eye (i.e. Chaos Marines). Nice rhyme eh??

Lone Wolves are dope and I understand why everyone wants to use them from time to time, can't fault you for using it to depict a crazy Marine running around on his own trying to punch someone in the face.

Using MoTW to represent a squad mate who's been possessed is also dope in my books, except you don't do it and have not modeled anyone (that I've seen!) accordingly.

Word Bearer's are a Legion that depends on massing demons and using the power of all four deities to get the job done. The Wolf codex can do some things that can reflect that, the problem is you don't see people taking the options that actually make sense, a few examples (took me 8 seconds to find 4)of choices that do make sense:
1. Using the wolf pack choice to represent demons - here you get a melee centered unit that runs around trying to eat things/tanks/people (sound like demons maybe?).
2. Characters with Saga of the Wolfkin - here we get a guy who has "control" over the wolves/demons (the logic burns my brain!.
3. Characters can also take wolves as wargear. A Dark Apostle with his pet demon buddies makes sense to me!
4. Characters with Saga of the Warrior Born - again an upgrade that reflects the fact that the more people a guy shanks the better at it he gets (Khorne be praised!)

Those are just some of the examples (plus a few that you've already mentioned) of what players could do, the problem is people don't. They plop down Rune Priests, units of Grey Hunters and units of rocket toting Long Fangs.

In all honesty Matt has taken a beating over the topic and I feel a little bad for him (like the Grinch my heart grows on occasion) but I do not agree with his justification. It's hollow and reads like a person grasping at straws as to why he can use a better more competitive book. If you want to use the Wolf codex with Chaos models then play corrupted 13th legion, recently turned Wolves, etc...There’s plenty of back story to back that up; however, if you want to play Word Bearer's then it’s time to use their book or start making choices that reflect their fluff...

I would feel bad. Then I would remember the Word bearer secret weapon: Uber wolf(word?) standard!
+1 attack for all!

I think matt's army is very pretty, and I never mind taking his sissy horse riding ninnies to the cleaners. But matt, honestly, a shitload of your army choices have NOTHING to do with fluff, and everything to do with the unit being powerful.

BUT, If it looks good, and is painted, then your lazy opponent with his plastic colored marines/bugs/=I=censor=I=-eaters can suck it long, and suck it hard. Bring a fully painted army to the table, that isn't lazily painted and converted, then you can yell at matt for using the codex to advantage.
And for being smelly.

And sucking off a horse.

Which he does, often.

Or so his sister tells me.

In the bedroom.

Paz wrote:I would feel bad. Then I would remember the Word bearer secret weapon: Uber wolf(word?) standard!
+1 attack for all!

I think matt's army is very pretty, and I never mind taking his sissy horse riding ninnies to the cleaners. But matt, honestly, a shitload of your army choices have NOTHING to do with fluff, and everything to do with the unit being powerful.

BUT, If it looks good, and is painted, then your lazy opponent with his plastic colored marines/bugs/=I=censor=I=-eaters can suck it long, and suck it hard. Bring a fully painted army to the table, that isn't lazily painted and converted, then you can yell at matt for using the codex to advantage.
And for being smelly.

And sucking off a horse.

Which he does, often.

Or so his sister tells me.

In the bedroom.

and here i thought i was the only one she was telling that too LOL

but you should hear what ben says about him tho

I don't think I've been called on abusing 'count as' too much. Excluding my skimmer platform demon prince...... But that was a temporary fix untill I got the model finished.

However I use a ton of counts as models in my armies. (Largely because I don't spend enough money collecting bits). The list would be as follows::

Space Marine Models 'counting as' Chaos Space Marines (marines, predators, and rhinos)

Khorne Berzerker Models 'counting as' Chaos Space Marines Marked to Khorne

Havoks holding Big Guns 'counting as' Havoks with Autocannons (if anyone has extra hand-held autocannon bits I will gladly buy them off you)

Chosen holding bolters 'counting as' holding meltas (again if anyone has some extra meltagun bits I'd love to buy them off you)

My kitbashed skimmerboard Daemon Prince (The one that uses Lash if you've played me)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

All these models are painted black, silver, and red and fit with the army. And if anyone was not sure what anything was, I would tell them, and that seemed ok.

I beleive that if a model is not 100% WYSIWYG, thats ok. As long as it is obvious what it should be. If there is no correlation with what it could be (ex: a Termagaunt as a Necron Warrior, or a Rhino as a Falcon Tank) then the player is Proxi'ing(which is completely different from using 'counts as'). IMHO, The recent problem arises largely due to the grey area of chaos players feeling that ANY other Codex would better represent their legion than the Chaos Codex.

Across many forums, I have seen Chaos Players building their armies as Blood Angels, as Space Wolves, or as Codex Marines. I feel that that is ok, as long as things match (dreads are dreads, termies are termies, marines are marines, predators are predators). I have thought about running with this trend and tossing my Marines onto the table as Blood Angels or DaemonHunters. But in the end, I would rather my Iron Warriors army 'count as' Black Legion and grab up Daemon Princes before they 'count as' Blood Angels and grabbing up Chaplains and Death Company.

A rejoinder: Mike

Lords: To the best of my knowledge I have only ran a lord on TW once and really dont have a desire to do so again. The fact that the wolf lord is a better choice than the chaos lord has nothing to do with it for me becuase, other than the one said time, I dont use this HQ.

Dark Apostle: Earlier I couldn't understand where your opinion was coming from on this issue earlier, then it dawned on me. When the dex came out I didnt really know you and the reciprocal would mean you probably didnt know I ran this wolf priest for a few months. As you can see it was an early conversion and paint work and i ended up dismantling and stripping him. Along with this guy I also have another PA chaplain that I want to use for my Dark Apostle. The extensive conversion and greenstuff work I need to do for it have disuaded me from starting however.

Rune Priest: Again for about the last 6 months I have been amassing bits to complete a 1k sons sorcerer 'merc' conversion I want to do but havnt gotten around to it. I actually find your arguement ironic because the wolf legion proper uses the same one within one of the HH novels to distance itself during the Nikea trial. The truth is rune priests are librarians. They might shake rattles and throw bones but in the end it is their use of the warp that allows the powers. Rune Priest = Librarian = Sorcerer.(On a side note another large arguement against the chaos dex is the sorcerer's, some of the oldest psykers in the galaxy, complete lack of nullifying power ala hood.

Chosen: ...wait we agree, omg get your rapture boots on I can see the 4 horsemen already!

Cultists: Heh it would seem I forgot to include what they are within the chaos dex: scouts. 4+ for carapace, better stats for exposure to the warp/training/genetic enhancement/etc.

ATSKNF: As I mentioned this is something I have only considered for the last few weeks and had absolutely no bearing on my switching to the wolf dex. But on the topic of fearless troops, chaos undivided excludes all cult troops and marks therefore it is glory generic marines for me. As i mentioned though this really had no bearing on my decision

Legion in general: I'm definitely on the same page here, demons make up a large part of the fluff for some of the different chapters within the legion. Personally I do prefer the cultist route over them.

I think a great deal of the problem stems from a lack of information. To anyone who has not been within my modelling room it probably looks like I am attempting to power game through a new codex. This is not the case at all, this is how I was hooked: chaplain check, wolf guard check, sold. Everything after that was just icing on the cake. Thunderwolves, I didn't even know what that was when I switched codecie. Every fluffy reason I have used to justify my switching codecie I have models for: 2 Dark Apostles, 1 Sorcerer, 10 warhounds, 5 possessed, etc. Sadly the flesh tearers, High elves, tomb kings, and ultramarines projects I have been working on combined with the fact that I have only played this army 2-3 times since the summer combined to push any new modelling/painting to the back of the line.

With that in mind I really cannot see how my reasoning can be interpreted as anything but competely solid ground. I want to play a current era Word Bearer Host and the chaos codex does not allow this in any stretch of the imagination. The space wolf codex does. It gives me the options I need to represent the units that are important to the character of my legion. I really hope this has dispelled any doubt as to why I chose this codex. Competativness had almost no bearing on it. Obviously I don't want to lose every game to a gimped codex but that is a distant second to the distinguishing features it permits me to use.

and @ Paz

on powerunits: The two units you're refering to actually came about for very different reasons that above. I freakin love the chaos knights and doom bull models. However the idea of buying almost $100 worth of gw product just to paint hurts my feelings, doubley so becuase I have 15k in school expenses and only 1/4 of the year to earn money. So I set out to find some way I could use them within the codex to justify their purchase to myself, voila thunderwolves and iron priest w/ TW mount. Just slappin the kits together as they were didnt really seem right to me so I went to extreme lengths to convert them, making all my thunderwolves wysiwyg and finding a hammer type weapon for the doom bull to represent the iron priest w/ thunderhammer. I definitely agree that the doom bull is a stretch to the iron priest and actually its because of the off hand remarks and eye rolling I got the 2 or 3 times I used it that it has now been retired to the shelf of shame.

Lolz rage.

smackman wrote:Lolz rage.

I think matt was crying when he typed his reply...

This says part one. When is part two?