Codex Chaos Daemons – A [Blog Community] Review

The Chaos Daemons Codex released by Games Workshop in March for Warhammer 40K is a tough one for me. I don’t play Daemons, nor do I feel much tempted to start now. I don’t play much against (!) Daemons either. They don’t seem to crop up in my corner of the UK (which is actually very much in the middle of the island, not in much of a corner).

Moreover, while I do like some of the bits and pieces in the Codex – notably the Masque of Slaanesh – I struggle to read longer stretches of the fluff without my thoughts drifting off.

Chaos – in its undistilled, daemonic form – works best for me in 40K as a background force that drives the motivation of others… the founding of the Grey Knights, the desperate depravity of the Dark Eldar, the dark bargains made by the Chaos Space Marines for revenge.

Putting Daemons front and centre makes them less interesting somehow… at least for me.

I also find Phil Kelly’s writing often terribly bland, though I know I am a minority there.

In short, it never really was a Codex that hooked me.

However, I know there are many die-hard fans of Games Workshop’s Daemons out there. Similarly, the old Chaos Daemons Codex seems to have gained a strong following among connoisseurs of advanced Warhammer 40K tactics, placing well at many tournaments despite its relative rarity among the Warhammer 40K player community more broadly.

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#1 – A Codex Daemons Review by Community Poll

To get out of the dilemma, I had the brilliant (or stupid, depending on who you ask) idea of crowd-sourcing the review of the Chaos Daemons Codex to you – the PinsofWar.com readers!

So I put up a poll and asked for some feedback.

The results of the poll were mostly positive, giving the Codex 3.5 Stars (3.28 rounded up) overall.

Was it a success?

Hard to say.

To me, it seems there is a striking discrepancy between the comments (which tend to be more critical) and the overall results of the poll. Here are some of the comments:

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#2 – Interpreting the Results: A Clash of Play-Styles?

How to interpret the results?

One could launch into long discussions if one side or another has it wrong. Pointless, I think.

To me, it seems the 6th edition Chaos Daemons army list and rules are fundamentally sound (and surprisingly sophisticated), but possibly frustrating to some players as they appeal to two very different styles of play and two very different type of 40K players at the same time.

Not considering both sides of this Daemonic coin, I would argue, can quickly turn your experience with the Chaos Daemons Codex into a nightmare. Read on and let me know what you think!

A – Chaos Daemons as Tactically Rewarding Specialist Army

For one, Chaos Daemons are obviously a “specialist army” that rewards careful tactical planning, exploiting unit-synergies and multi-step strategies to move the different elements of a Chaos Daemons army to the right spot on the battlefield at the right time.

The majority of basic Daemons (and many of their more specialized and larger cousins) are fiendishly good at dealing out damage, but rather frail and vulnerable in the open. Yet unlike Orks or even Tyranids, Chaos Daemons don’t have the numbers to compensate for many losses.

Nor, obviously, do Daemons have “classic” Transports to move across the table.

The iconic Bloodletter from the cover of the Codex is a great example. Bloodletters are murderously good at taking apart Space Marines (and just about everything else) in close combat. Yet they will quickly be shredded by rapid-firing Bolters if caught out in the open.

There is no middle ground.

In order to get your Bloodletters to where they need to be (to continue with this example), the Codex hands Daemon players an incredible, and incredibly complex, set of tools, including Icons, Artefacts, Spells, etc… , that must be mastered to succeed with a Chaos Daemons army.

Simply deploying and running up to your opponent is a recipe for disaster.

The Chaos Daemons Codex encourages and rewards strategic thinkers and tinkers, who have the patience and ambition to construct an army list that is not simply “Daemons on the table”, but already a detailed battle-plan for how things should unfold over the various turns of an entire Warhammer 40K game.

B – Chaos Daemons as “Roll-With-The-Dice” Army

Then there is the “flip-side” of the many random tables and elements in the new Chaos Daemons Codex, with the Warp Strom Table arguably being the most notorious.

Not only the Chaos Daemons, but the entire game of Warhammer 40K has been given a heavy injection of random tables and events. Daemons always had strong ties to random tables and Games Workshop clearly upped it further with the 6th Edition Chaos Daemons Codex.

While the random events and tables fit the Chaos Daemons tradition, they – on a conceptual level – strike me as slightly at odds with an army that pivots on carefully orchestrated stratagems to work effectively, precisely because your carefully made plans are constantly in danger of going awry on the next roll you make on a random table of your own Codex.

High levels of randomness would – I think – be less resented in an army with lots of “Grey Hunter-style” units, which can fill almost any role, no matter what happens or where they end up.

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#3 – Who Should Play Chaos Daemons in 40K?

In the end, I think it takes a rare breed of players to enjoy and master the Chaos Daemons Codex in Warhammer 40K.

Those that come to Chaos Daemons for the hilarity of random rolls, going at it “Ork-style” (for lack of a better comparison), will quickly be frustrated, as they find that the army still falls short, even when the dice favour them, without sound preparation.

Those that come to Chaos Daemons for the challenge of a specialist army, savouring the prospect of advanced tactics, will quickly be frustrated as their carefully laid-out plans are made null and void by a few mutinous dice.

To enjoy the Chaos Daemons Codex, it seems to me, you have to enjoy both!

You have to dig into the many options, synergies and layers offered by the Daemonic Spells, Artefacts and Special Rules to build a Chaos Daemons army list and (!) you have to savour the prospect of things going rapidly down a most unexpected direction mid-game (or even right off  the bat) at the drop of a hat.

If that sounds awesome to you… than the Chaos Daemons Codex was definitely written for you!

Z.