Introduction

Hey there, I’m Scuzgob and I play Stabbing and Armour the Army. Let’s talk about them, yeah?

At first glance, Warriors of Chaos has changed very little from its 7th edition incarnation. It is not a subtle army. It is an army where you run large mobs of combat infantry into guys and then roll dice until everything is dead. If you have a thing for Chaos, screaming Vikings and big monsters you’ll probably have tremendous fun doing so.

Moving to 8th, Warriors of Chaos (WoC) mainly changed in the army list section. On average, bodies are cheaper to take, while upgrades for said bodies are slightly more expensive. Some of the regulars have shifted their FOC slots, and a few new units joined the fray, but what you’ll usually be taking is a few large blocks of warriors supported by marauders and wizards. Like the new Chaos Space Marines, units start relatively cheap but can quickly get very costly when you start piling on the gear. Moderation is the key to writing a WoC list; they may have the best statlines in the game for basic troops and characters, but they will struggle if overspending causes them to be outnumbered. WoC can get by very well with their basic gear if you know how to use them, and the army can function extremely effectively when focused on a single point of the enemy battleline rather than spread out. They’re operating by overwhelming force, after all.

They are, however, not without some problems. As said above, they can quickly get expensive to field, and their characters more so. As tempting as it is to take a fully tooled up Chaos Lord, Herohammer has not returned, despite what the Eye of the Gods rule tells you. Wizards can pretty quickly suck up points, and their spell lores are quite awkward to use in an army that demands to be in combat so much. And, like Chaos Marines, they suffer somewhat from Leadership issues, having lost the ability to re-roll failed Panic tests. Having a unit of warriors be run down can be quite a painful blow, so a battle standard will be required in larger games. With changes to Marauders, WoC also lack a truly cheap horde unit to compare with Goblins, Gnoblars or Zombies, though they have a lot of tools allowing them to whittle down such units. Aside from the Hellcannon and a handful of breath weapons, the WoC shooting phase is non-existent, leading them to rely on magic to thin out enemy troops before charging in. And mastering multiple charges in a single turn is key to success with WoC.

Marks of Chaos
They do the things they’ve always done. Khorne gives you Frenzy, Tzeentch buffs your ward save, and so on. It’s better to discuss marks on a unit by unit basis, so they’ll be covered more in depth later in the review. It’s worth noting that they’re purchased on a per model basis, meaning they're much cheaper to take on small units, but can easily lead to a vast jump in price for a larger unit. And as usual, you can’t mix Marks in units, something to be aware of when writing army lists.

Eye of the Gods
This challenge-based rule has had an overhaul too, bringing the Warriors in line with Chaos Marines. Like CSM, they must always challenge, and cannot refuse a challenge, though in WHFB you won’t be cringing as your guy is forced into a challenge with a power fist. If you kill a guy in a challenge, or take out a monster, you get to roll on a cute table of bonuses. The table itself is much smaller than the CSM version too, and not quite as annoying. And unlike CSM, unit champions are optional here, so you can avoid this rule entirely if you wish.
A double 1 is of course the bad result, potentially turning your guy into a Chaos Spawn. Notice potentially. Unlike CSM, your guy can avoid this fate by passing a Leadership test, resulting in Stupidity or a LD penalty instead of becoming a spawn.
3 gets you a BS bonus. Very funny, Mr Cruddace. Most of the others are buffs to combat related attributes, all very welcome. A 7 is no longer a “nothing happens” result, which is nice, giving the champion a single re-roll to use for a turn.
The biggest change is result number 12. You take a test, similar to the spawn result, and if you pass you become a Daemon Prince. However, unlike CSM, this Prince keeps all his wargear! While a rare result, the implications of getting something as powerful as a Prince are pretty huge, and can sometimes win you the game. Don’t count on it though.
Eye of the Gods is a fun little rule, but certainly not something to base your army around. Don’t bet on a Daemon Prince appearing just when you need it to, and taking a load of Warshrines and small Marauder units with a champion to increase the odds is a silly idea. I know some of you were thinking of doing it.