1500 Chaos Fleet Help?

[the big bz]

I've just a acquired a large amount of Chaos ships and I was wondering if anyone could help me with a good, effective, balanced starting fleet?

I have pretty much the entire Chaos range...

Thanks in advance.

[Zhukov]

You're gonna have to be a bit more detailed than that. How many of each ship, for example? And are you looking for a power fleet or an interesting, fluffy fleet? Which fleets are you going to be playing against mostly?

-Zhukov

[Sigoroth]

The staple cruiser of the Chaos fleet is the Carnage, though some would have you believe it's the Murder. The Devastation is a very good ship and should fill 90% of all your carrier needs. Between the Carnage and the Devastation you will have the bulk of your fleet. You can add Acherons and Desolators as points allow, as these are both very good ships for their cost. The Styx is now a decent choice for its cost.

The Slaughter is an excellent ship for its cost, but it plays very differently to a typical Chaos fleet. Still, a fleet made up of Slaughters, Executors, and Repulsives could potentially work due to the sheer amount of firepower these ships have, but it would be a bloody fight and only worth trying as an experiment (best tried against Necrons I would say).

I would tend to steer clear of Murders, Hades and Despoilers. Used together in a themed fleet I'd expect them to fair worse than the Slaughter/Executor/Repulsive list. If you're tempted to sprinkle one or two of these ships in to your normal fleet then go for the Hades, but be warned, it'll die quick.

Escorts for Chaos are mostly rubbish. Fill points with Infidels if you really must take them.

The Planet Killer is an excellent ship for larger battles, though as a unique character ship your opponent may not want to see it in every one of your lists. Ignore the Powers of Chaos file. It's rubbish.

[Martini Henrie]

I don't want to hijack the thread, but I'm gonna a bit  I'm looking for the same sort of list, and as I'm newly returning to BFG I can't remember much about ship choices.  I'm looking to make a rounded list with at least one Grand cruiser in it (I really like the mini).  The list needs to be effective against Eldar and Imperial/Marine lists.  I'm re-buying the minis so no real restrictions.  Thanks in advance and I hope any results from this might help big bz

[Zhukov]

Escorts for Chaos are mostly rubbish. Fill points with Infidels if you really must take them.

Don't forget you can take a squadron of Imperial escorts in a Chaos fleet now!

-Zhukov

[Phthisis]

I've been learning how to play a chaos fleet for a few months now.  I disagree that the carnage is the 'staple' of the chaos fleet. It has its uses.  Carnages are very scary for Eldar and anything that counts as 'defense'.  But against other targets where they are trying to penetrate 6+ armor or are shooting at an abeam target, even their formidable firepower isnt enough.   Long range lances are the bread and butter of a chaos fleet, IMHO, and usually lance ships carry enough batteries to get by.  If youre making a standard list, include a carnage but never rely on them.

Murders are better, but I only like the variant with side lances.  Two lances each side and front at 45 and 60 respectively means you don't have to worry so much about keeping your broadsides to the enemy and allows for lots of opportunistic shooting. It has more synergy wjth the rest of the fleet.  The Murder is also 10pts cheaper.

But if I has to name a ship as a 'staple' it would be the Devestation.  Those attack craft squadrons will always come in handy.  Either you will need them for CAP or you can bomb/assault enemy ships.  With 2 lances and a little bit of defensive batteries, its a great all rounder that can counter enemy ordnance while causing damage as well.  Some complain that Devs are undercosted, but I believe that the Dev is what we get in place of mass torpedo salvoes.

At 1500 I havent had much luck with a battleship.  They are an obvious target for concentrated torpedo fire as they can't turn out of the way and they give up a ton of VPs.  They might require more baby-sitting than chaos can muster at 1500.  

Don't neglect escorts.  They may not be theoretically necessary, but you'll want some to keep light cruisers and escorts off your tail.  And they are a cheap way to add additional lances and get torpedos!

[Vaaish]

Well if you look at the desolater, it's basically an Acheron with more hits and a bit more range. If you use it as a fire magnet that's less shooting going into your cruisers. If you lose it, well, you aren't really losing a substantial amount of your firepower. Basically try to let the thing tank to keep pressure off your cruisers.

Anyway, Chaos doesn't typically need escorts because all their carriers have AB standard which really rip up enemy escorts. It remains to be seen, though, how the changes in the 2011 revision will change that balance. Chaos may indeed need a few escorts around to help out since they don't have light cruisers to use.

[horizon]

I really dislike the lance-Murder in my tactical views.

The Murder-Carnage debate is ages old.
The Murder (prow on) has 2 lances, equals around 9wb @ 60cm. The Carnage being abeam can do 10wb
@ 60cm.
Being abeam is better then going prow on.

Under 45cm the Carnage has 16wb vs 10wb of the Murder.
Given the point difference the Carnage should be better and is better. So that's really okay.

The Desolator is awesome. Fast and excellent long range support. I use it from 1200pts and upwards.
Acheron in same league. Overlooked vessel but very good.

Devestation is indeed a good carrier. But since I prefer gunnery play over ordnance play I will never call it the staple cruiser for Chaos.

I never leave without escorts, Infidels & Iconoclasts always serve me well.

[Sigoroth]

I've been learning how to play a chaos fleet for a few months now.  I disagree that the carnage is the 'staple' of the chaos fleet. It has its uses.  Carnages are very scary for Eldar and anything that counts as 'defense'.  But against other targets where they are trying to penetrate 6+ armor or are shooting at an abeam target, even their formidable firepower isnt enough.   Long range lances are the bread and butter of a chaos fleet, IMHO, and usually lance ships carry enough batteries to get by.  If youre making a standard list, include a carnage but never rely on them.

No wonder Chaos aren't considered an overpowered tournament fleet, people play Murders. Comparison:

Carnage
- abeam aspect
- maximises range
- greater focusable fire
- gets more powerful as the game goes on
- superior against 6+ prows when locked on

Murder
- 10 pts cheaper
- better against 6+ prows when not locked on
- better against abeam ships at long range

The early benefits of the Murders firepower against abeam ships quickly evaporates as soon as you get to 45cm range. While the Murder can technically get more firepower at 45cm by going at an angle to get a target abeam and one to the fore this splits the ships focus, and so is less effective. Also, this could require more in the way of manoeuvring and so reduce lock-on opportunities.

Further, the Murder actually closes with the enemy. This is terrible against fleets that require splitting the enemy lines, such as Imperial. The Carnage can go completely abeam or even move slightly away from the enemy and still get a firing solution and on LO at that.

These advantages to the Carnage are enough to compensate for the 10 pt differential. That is to say, the Murder and Carnage would be on a par as far as fleet choices are concerned if this were all there was to it. However, there is more. The Murder will die a lot faster. A lot. A locked-on Murder against an abeam Carnage will get 1.5 hits. A locked-on Carnage against a closing Murder will get 2.8 hits. This is in the 45-60cm range bracket. When we get down to the 30-45cm bracket the Murder could stay locked-on and closing giving it the same firepower but increasing the Carnages average hits to 4.4 OR it could forgo LO to turn to present broadsides, in which case it is simply out-gunned from there on in.

The Carnage is superior to the Murder. Murder = liability, Carnage = reliability.

[Vaaish]

As primarily an imperial player whose main opponent is chaos, I've faced the 2x carnage abeam many times and it's never performed well. It has range but does precious little when it's using that range so it has to close or wait for the enemy to close to have an effect. Once it closes, the slaughter has more firepower in the same range band making the carnage a little iffy outside of Eldar. When my opponent switched to murders, he started performing much better.

[Phthisis]

True.  Sigroth is being a bit too theoretical and simplistic here.  His examples are isolated ships in clean space with no blast markers.  Also, he is dealing in fractions of a hit, which don't exist in game.
Sigi, your list of advantages to the Carnage make no sense.What on earth do you mean by Carnages get more powerful as the game goes on?  Do yours get more guns for being cripples or shooting through a zillion blast markers?  Or do they form into Voltron? Same goes for 'greater focusable fire'.  How are you 'focusing' the fire in a way the Murder cant?  Both ships are deadly at abeam and primarily used as such.  The Murder is better at closing 6+ armor whether the Carnage is LO or not. 

Heres something to think about Sigi.  Youre calculating the median average result from fire, but ignoring the rest of the bell curve.  Because you only acheive success 1/3 of the time, the curve is weighted towards the failure side.  Since fractions of hits don't happen, you cant save up two .5 hits to make 1 whole over 2 turns.  Those 2 half hits make zero hits.  Also, with each dice you are more likely to miss than hit.  This means that you are more likely to roll worse than the median than to roll better.  Its still possible to get 2 hits rather than 1 but it is much more likely the result will be zero than 2.  This means that the Carnage can easily underperform from Sigi's expectations.
Thats the theory never seems to pan out, especially when locked on.

Don't get me wrong.  Carnages are fun and have their uses.  But the side lance variant Murder has a much more even bell curve distribution and so is much more reliable and more likely to score more hits at long range, and distance and blast markers arent a factor.   Also, when facing a fleet of larger than one ship, you can manouvre so you can fire forward lancez as well as your side weaponry to greater effect than one carnage at one target.

Ultimately it comes down to playing style.  Murders are better against 6+ armor and at range.  If you like to stay out of range and shoot, take the Murder variant.  If you like to get in close and scrap, Carnages are better than murders if you squadron them, but Slaughters would perform better with that style.

[Valhallan]

just squadron your carnage with your acheron. its a death dealing machine. 22wb at 45 and 4 lances? plenty enough FP to force a brace on anything with <=2 shields.

I've also found the carnage still wins because of the lock on opportunities granted by the way it needs to engage (abeam, skirting the enemy fleet). *lock on makes WB's better than lances vs 5+ and vs 6+ it evens out to about Ar 5+. its also the perfect ship for crossing their T.

not that murders are bad per say, but I don't often use them... though now with the hectate......

[RCgothic]

Also, he is dealing in fractions of a hit, which don't exist in game.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/YouFailStatisticsForever

[Plaxor]

Nice. RC has win.

Sigoroth did a long argument about how according to the averages theory a Gothic would be a useless vessel. Because it would almost always score only 2 hits, doing nothing against any other cruiser.

[Phthisis]

Now that the obligatory argument is over, maybe we can answer the poor guy's question.  Welcome to the SG!