The Emperor’s Children Index disappointingly sees no changes from the CSM Index

The new Emperor’s Children Index has been released on Warhammer Community with, somewhat disappointingly, no changes to Lucius or Noise Marines.

This is isn’t that surprising, it was to be expected from the original announcement however there were some outstanding questions about how exactly the statements there would eventuate in the Emperors Children Index.

There was speculation, and hope, that we might see slightly tweaked datasheets (particularly OC2 on our Noise Marines) or some hints and what the new Emperor’s Children Codex may bring, particularly if which units could take the Mark of Slaanesh was updated.

Instead we have exactly the same as we had under the Chaos Space Marine 10th Edition Index, right down to specifying how the Index functions under Pactbound Zealots and the Mark of Slaanesh (in fact, the only place this interaction occurs other than the mark on the Daemon Princes).

Implications for the Emperor’s Children with new new Chaos Space Marine Codex

Pactbound Zealots Detachment

First off the bat, this detachment is now much lower down in the rankings of usefulness for us. The Mark of Slaanesh on all units is now forced.

As before this does not synergise with Noise Marines given they should be running as a shooting unit with Slaanesh Legionaries the far better options for Melee.

The same goes for any other shooting platform, they will be less than optimal here given they will the the sustained 5+ in Melee and the regular 6+ in shooting and so inferior to Tzeentch or Nurgle for the same points.

Shout out to the now slightly more useful Defiler, an oddity in a mixed use unit that benefits here, the Hellbrute could fall into that as well but this is very much clutching at straws.

That isn’t to say we still don’t have play here, the detachment remains strong and Slaanesh Legionaries were already seeing use. However just to Include Lucius you are imposing a hefty restriction on the detachment as expected in the prior analysis.

Other Epic Heroes

It was somewhat expected that the Emperor’s Children index would preclude the use of other Epic heroes as they couldn’t take the Mark of Slaanesh. The good news here is that this isn’t the case and you can still run any of them, aside from the restriction that Lucius must be your warlord.

Special note for Abaddon. He can indeed be included with EC but you will note that he also has the “must be your warlord” requirement in his datasheet. A Reminder that there has been rules commentary on this and when two such models are in an army you select your Warlord.

This commentary refers to the model though. The Chosen of Slaanesh Army Rule states that Lucius must be your warlord, so no loopholes here running both with Abaddon as your Warlord under the Emperor’s Children Index to get around restrictions.

Rather hilariously though this means if you include both then Abaddon is relegated to being Lucius’ Lieutenant.

allies

You’ll note that there are no allies listed here, however don’t panic. The allies rules for Knights and Daemons are contained in their respective Indices.

As before, with Lucius as our Warlord, the restriction is to Slaanesh daemons only. Outside theme few were running these competitively so so change there.

Sadly still no Shalaxi as an option at 2000 points given we must take a battleline unit for each other unit and a unit of Daemonettes and, combined with Shalaxi, that puts us over the 500 point limit.

The main item of note here is the loss entirely of taking Nurglings. You weren’t running those anyway were you as a true devotee of Slaanesh? It’s not like 25+ year old Epic Daemonette miniatures made good ‘Slaanlings’? No, of course not.

Other detachments

In line with the above, there is really very little impact on any of the other detachments. Essentially taking option to run Emperor’s Children you have the ability to also take Lucius but cannot take units or allies with the marks.

Emperor’s Children Index – General analysis

All in all very little to see here. There is minimal impact on the original hot takes from the Chaos Space Marine Codex Leaks.

If you have been running Emperor’s Children thematically then the index doesn’t change much. Moving away from the restrictive Slaves to Darkness / Pactbound Zealots and having detachments that don’t have less than ideal usage on the Mark of Slaanesh is welcome and has far more impact.

The lack of restrictions in those detachments is also great, competitively, however we have also lost a lot of the flavour of running an god specific list under the Emperor’s Children Index. It would have been nice to see some more restrictions and a boon across the board or the like to offset this.

The ability to include the other non-aligned Epic heroes particularly breaks the theme, as does the hilarity of including Abaddon as Lucius’ number two.

Ultimately for seven of the eight detachments the the question boils down to whether or not including Lucius and up to three extra Noise Marine Units is worth losing access to other allies and Daemons. (and restrictions on Daemon Princes, but that’s less of a thought, competitively at least)

Some of the other cult troops are looking particularly nasty in a few detachments, however that goes the same for Lucius with the increasingly rare ability to grant a unit Fights First.

Combine him with the a Master of Executions for Re-rolls and, more importantly, Scout (via enhancement) in a Rhino under Renegade Raiders and you have one of the most effective units in the entire Chaos Space Marine Codex.

The biggest hit here is the loss of Nurglings and their invaluable infiltrate ability and secondary scoring options. They have already been lightly touched by the balance changes before though (points). Given the prevalence expect to see that again (particularly losing battleline as an ally and this requiring a unit of Plague Bearers for each unit would eliminate their widespread usage)

Emperor’s Children Index – The Bottom Line

All in all there are some competitive considerations, leaning toward running Emperor’s Children being net negative almost solely because of Nurgling access in most detachments, and a major hurdle to using Pactbound Zealots with the now enforced full Mark of Slaanesh application.

Thematically, and advancing us in any away with more knowledge around the future Emperor’s Children Codex, this is a disappointment. No doubts about that. Hopefully we don’t have too much longer to wait.

At the very least though we can officially, once again, run an “Emperor’s Children” force, at that’s something.

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