I own a handful of very old Chaos Space Marines models for Warhammer 40,000, and I've acquired a few updated models in the Blackstone Fortress. I also had a spare Armiger Helverin model that I decided to paint black, and a black Land Raider model I also use for my Iron Hands army, and some Wargames Atlantic Raumjagers I kitbashed into Chaos allies. In short, I've cobbled together a small Chaos army, so I decided to buy the Chaos Space Marines Codex for 10th edition Warhammer 40,000 to make it official, and this is my review of it.
In Warhammer, a codex contains rules and lore specific to a certain army. It's a good mix of fictional military history, painting inspiration and guides, and game specifications ("datasheets") for the plastic miniatures you use to play the game.
In the 3rd edition codex for Chaos Space Marines, the term "chaos space marines" included the Black Legion (Chaos united), and the legions dedicated to the 4 Chaos gods. By the time I purchased Chaos Space Marines Codex for the 10th edition, there had already been a individual codexes released for the Thousand Sons (Tzeentch), World Eaters (Khorne), Death Guard (Nurgle), and Emperor's Children (Slaanesh), so I was vaguely aware that this book would have to be very different to the 3rd edition codex.
The 3rd edition codex uses the concept of space marines dedicated to the Dark Powers as a foundation. On page 44, it says as much:
The Black Legion is in many ways the basis for Codex: Chaos Space Marines [...]
What this means is that you built an army of Chaos Space Marines, and then you chose the "mark" of a specific Chaos god. This applied a themed template onto your army, giving it rules that reflected your choice. It was a really elegant system. (Or at least, it read that way. I've never played 3rd edition Warhammer 40,000, so I can't speak from experience.)
Since then, I guess the model selection has probably grown a lot, and probably Games Workshop has the capacity to release more books, so each Chaos faction has its own dedicated codex.
You may have already done the math, but there are 4 Chaos gods (Tzeentch, Khorne, Nurgle, Slaanesh), but 5 factions of traitor marines (Thousand Sons, World Eaters, Death Guard, Emperor's Children, and Chaos Space Marines.) Where do the Chaos Space Marines fit in? What they even for?
Well, this codex positions Chaos Space Marines not as a foundational army for any one of the 4 Chaos gods, but instead as the traitor marine faction that can function with no god at all. It's a little similar to the concept of the Imperial Agents. Chaos Space Marines cover all the traitor marine legions without an explicit allegiance to a Chaos god. That's the Black Legion, Night Lords, Word Bearers, Iron Warriors, and Alpha Legion. As you build your army, you can spend a percentage of your build points to add units from a faction that is dedicated to a Chaos god. Pretty simple.
The lore section is about 40 pages, and if you let your mind wander then you'll think you're reading a Horus Heresy book. The Black Legion (even in the 3rd edition codex) is the legion that once belonged to Horus Lupercal. Formerly known as the Luna Wolves, and then as the Sons of Horus, they were the legion that first formally broke from the Imperium. After Horus was slain by the Emperor, his second-in-command, Abaddon the Despoiler, assumed control.
In many ways, Abaddon overshadows Horus in the world of 40k (the Citadel paint isn't called Horus Black, after all). He's alive, to start with, and he's led 13 crusades against the Imperium (which totally have not failed, they've just been small components of a much bigger plan that's definitely still on track).
The lore section contains a lot about Abaddon and his Black Crusades. They've been major events in Warhammer 40,000 lately, so it's good to catch up on the specifics, and to learn about characters like Vashtorr the Arkifane and Huron Blackheart and Fabius Bile.
I enjoyed the lore section, although it does try to pack a lot of information into 40 pages. If you ever needed to legally prove that the universe of Warhammer 40,000 is complex, then the Space Marines codex and Chaos Space Marines is the only evidence you need.
20 legions of space marines that aren't legions, because they were split into chapters, but we still talk about most of them based on the original legions, aside from the ones like Black Templars that are popular enough to stand independently, and also aside from 2 and 11 because they were stricken from the record, and also the Chaos ones are still basically legions, and 4 of them serve a different Chaos god each, but there's a fifth that's a catch-all for the ones that don't worship any god, but using some build options you can make the fifth partially aligned to one of the 4 gods that it doesn't worship.
But I honestly think that this kind of lore is partly why the fictional universe feels so real. I'm not saying that all you have to do to make a world feel real is make it over-complex and confusing, but I guess detail counts for a lot. Warhammer has a lot of detail, and it's not just cursory flavour text like on a Magic: The Gathering card. The Black Library has novels to back it up, and while there are definitely contradictions and retcons, there are less that you'd expect from a property that's been around for 40 years.
As if to confirm the diversity of this army, there are nearly 20 pages of photographs of painted miniatures. I don't anticipate painting any Chaos faction other than Black Legion, but if I did then I'd get so much use out of these pages. When you're painting a historical army, you have lots of sources for instruction and inspiration, because there are lots of books about history. But when you're building an army from a fictional universe, the only source you have is the fiction. The showcase has lots of meticulously painted models, so you can see what's possible, what the fiction asserts, and also how it'll all look on the battlefield.
The Combat Patrol featured in the book is called Zarkan's Daemonkin, and contains Aranis Zarkan, 5 Possessed, 10 Legionaries, and 10 Cultists. I haven't played it yet, although I've built a similar list by accident. Zarkan is obviously the warlord and can do some big power attacks, the Possessed are shock troops, the Legionaries are rank-and-file infantry, and the Cultists are cannon fodder. This is a beautiful build, actually, because it models a very sensible approach to building a functioning army. If you've never built an army for a wargame before, then this list demonstrates where your head ought to be, generally speaking. This is an all-purpose army, and attaining it is a realistic goal, in terms of money and painting effort.
In short, this is one of my favourite Combat Patrols because it feels highly pragmatic.
At the time of writing, I haven't played any of the detachments in the book. The detachment included in the initial index for Chaos Space Marines was called Slaves to Darkness, and that's not in this book at all.
Again, there's a lot of variety here because one Chaos Space Marine army can look surprisingly distinct from another Chaos Space Marine army. Personally, my Chaos Space Marine army just wandered off a battlefield of the Horus Heresy and are just starting to learn about the gifts of Chaos. But with these detachments, I'm eager to incorporate some actual [fictional] daemons into the army and see how differently the army can play.
The datasheet section of the book is, really, why the book exists. This section contains the numbers and abilities for each model within the Chaos Space Marines faction. That includes the obvious stuff, like a Chaos Lord and Legionaries, but it also has a Daemon Prince, Fellgor Beastmen, Chaos Spawn (very fun), and of course tanks and weird daemon vehicles.
Unfortunately, there aren't many daemons in these datasheets. I think they're probably in the codexes for the Chaos gods. Fortunately, the initial release of 10th edition Warhammer 40,000 provided datasheets for Chaos Daemons, and I'm happy to just use that for the few daemons I can be bothered to cobble together. (I'm not invested enough in Chaos to go out of my way for it.)
The final section, as usual, are faction rules for a campaign. For Chaos Space Marines, you form a Chaos Warband, and then as you fight battles you earn Chaos Points. You can spend Chaos Points to increase your Personal glory, the glory of your Dark God, or the glory of your Warfleet. You must invest your Chaos Points wisely, because before each battle you gain favour or punishments depending on the levels of glory in each category. It seems like a fun mini-game, and I'm eager to try it out.
There are also Crusade Relics and even Daemon Weapons, and some of them are pretty powerful. I really want Thaa'ris and Rhi'Ol the Rapacious, so I am determined to play a Crusade with Chaos Space Marines, and also accomplish a Glory Agenda so I can acquire the weapon. It's complex, but I think it'll be worth it.
Final page of the book, there's a Chaos Space Marines name generator. There have been more name generators than I'd expected in the codexes, and I use them all the time, but I never remember to mention them in my reviews. If you like a good random table, this is one for cool names.
Chaos Space Marines Codex for 10th edition Warhammer 40,000 is a fun book. It's obviously essential if you play a Chaos Space Marines army. It can also just be a fun set of rules to mix things up, should you ever decide to play your Blood Angels as a Khorne army, or your Iron Hands as Iron Warriors, or whatever. At the very least, it's a book full of great lore and photographs of epic miniature battles, and I think it's well worth it.