The rumblings of imminent battle have begun to reverberate around Tsaragrad. Let's take a look at the forces of the Cult of Rust!
In what is becoming a yearly tradition, my brother and I will be getting together over MLK weekend for several games of 40k.
This upcoming weekend of gaming promises to bring a trio of "firsts":
There's one big reason to hope (expect?) that we won't need to wait another year before playing more 40k. Getting together in person was harder in 2023 than previous years, so my brother and I decided to gift each other a basic setup for playing virtual 40k games (via video calls) in the spirit of the holidays combined with a new edition of 40k.
Realistically we will probably only play a couple times per month at best, but we thought it would be fun to keep up some momentum for our 40k endeavors virtually.
Since 2024 is so far looking to be the year of the Cult of Rust and more gaming-heavy than 2023, I thought I would take this post to walk through my rationale in designing four different CSM lists I hope to play over MLK weekend.
1. The Cult of Rust is a hobby project first and foremost, and is therefore not intended to be a gaming-focused army. It is important to me that this project stays relatively contained and tight; as in, I won't be buying and building rapidly beyond what my brother gifted me last summer. I'll also be focusing on building and painting a relatively small collection of units before expanding so I don't end up with a massive pile of depressingly grey plastic.
This means that I'll be building lists based strictly on the models I currently own (or can easily proxy).
2. While the Cult of Rust is a Nurgle-dedicated Iron Warriors warband in the story of Volarius/Tsaragrad, I'm not opposed to using a variety of Chaos god marks on the tabletop to get the most out of the Slaves to Darkness launch detachment (or at least until the CSM Codex comes out later this year, that is). Check out this recent post for a probabilistic analysis of the boons the Chaos deities can grant their followers in this new edition!
3. These are not meant to be ultra-competitive lists. In that vein, I will be fielding units I like even if they're not optimal.
With that out of the way, let's get on to the lists!
The Iron Warriors are the galaxy's preeminent siege force who wage war with relentless applications of might even when facing heavy casualties. The Nurgle allegiance of the Cult of Rust leans even further into this theme by emphasizing durability and mid-to-close range firefights over the rapid mobility of Slaanesh, the melee brutality of Khorne, or the cunning ploys of Tzeentch.
I wanted this list to be a reflection of how I imagine the Cult of Rust would really operate on the battlefield in the 41st millenium: dominating the midboard through durability while keeping the opponent on their back foot by a focused application of superior close-range firepower. I also wanted to retain many of the classic Iron Warriors elements, like Havocs, daemon engines, vehicles, and lots of ranged heavy weapons, even if that meant passing up on the more competitive choices in the 10th edition Chaos index.