Warhammer 40K: The New CSM Defiler is Giving Me Feelings
Goatboy here talking about the new 40K Chaos Defiler kit that GW showed last week – both my hopes and fears.
Just like the Mutilators from the week before this new Defiler release has me very excited. I have a weird love/hate relationship with the old Defiler kit. It was such a weird model and has some fun history behind it when I came back into the game after an absence.
I Was Meh On the Old Defiler
After graduating college back in 2000 I left the game for a few years. It was during the middle of 3rd Edition and between getting an adult job and a doomed relationship I was not thinking about throwing dice for Chaos. I came back when the relationship ended and while looking at the kits for Chaos Space Marines the old Defiler stood out. It was a weird kit, a push into the idea of Daemon Engines, and showcased some fun new design ideas that are kind of lost right now in current models. Still it look a bit goofy and sadly doesn’t really fit into the game right now.
kinda derpy…
HELLO New 2026 Defiler!
Welp the new kit fixes a ton of these things and I hope it fixes a few of the other game issue it has – like movement, damage potential, and game play potential. Let’s talk about how it looks and what I think it means for the game. Overall I think the new design is pretty spot on to how Chaos has started to look. There is this huge base of muscles representing the idea of a Daemon taking over the machine and growing out of its prison. All of the weapons look brutal and built into the daemon machine. It just looks mean as heck.
The other important aspects of the look is that all the Chaos gods are represented. I see this lovely new Slaanesh symboled monster and wonder if this will be the nice bump into the EC build to give some shooting that isn’t just Noise Marines controlling a lane of damage. I like all the other designs too and wonder if again will give some life to World Eaters with a decent shooting platform to let all the other close combat parts do their work.
The looks are awesome and my only fear in all of this is the lovely huge base the model is sitting on. It is a huge base – looks like the size of Fulgrim’s – and we all know how much of a pain it is to move those things around. Heck they needed to invent a detachment that lets Fulgrim use a Stratagem for free to go thru walls. I wonder if we are going to see one of the default ones in the future move to this as well as some of the other “common” options show up as something anyone can take. I can only hope.
New Defiler Hopes & Fears
If the models movement is only sitting at its current 8” this giant kit might not work in the current game of 40K. I hope they shift it to 12” or if they were smart let there be two different versions for armies that push the assault based one to be faster at 12” with the shooting variant sitting around 10”. 12” Allows the model to sit on one side and get enough movement to get to the other side of a ruin most of the time. You can see this in how the new Lord of Skulls for WE can easily make it over a terrain piece and be useful – if it was only a bit cheaper.
Let’s look at the weapons. It would appear it is loaded out with a decent amount of firepower if you look at all the weapons. It has the crazy whipping chain hand for close combat. I wonder if there is another one for the other side to complete the assault variant option. I don’t know if it is any good unless it moves extremely fast and has free tank shock etc. Will ignore this and look at the shooting stuff.
We have options for a bunch of twinlinked lascannons, a battle cannon option, looks like a mean old plasma cannon, 2 Excruciator Cannons (from the Venom Crawler?), Twinlinked Flamer thing, A big Reaper Autocannon option, and finally the Missile Launcher. I don’t know what we’ll see output-wise but the Excruciator cannons that looked locked in are exciting as well as a giant Plasma cannon with all the Lascannons. All of those sound great for the weapon ranges to help out EC as well as WE so you can count me as excited.
GW, Please Point Cost The Defiler Well
I think the hope for me in all of this is this Daemon Engine isn’t going to be more expensive than a Land Raider and help all the current Chaos armies with a new threat that can put the hurt on the enemy with damage 2+ weapons. It needs to be tough enough to take a few hits and hopefully control a lane of fire. Really I just want it to be good. I also hope the Mutilators showcase the same sort of thing that all the armies get it as well because being able to “boost” up each Chaos Army with a few releases is why Chaos is the best.
What do you think the new Defiler needs stat-wise?
