In this article series we’re taking a look at the vehicle options available to each faction, looking at what they can do on the table, and talking about when and how to field them. You can find our Competitive Faction Focus article on the World Eaters here.

The World Eaters don’t have a ton of options for Vehicles and Monsters, and among the options they do have, one is a must-take (Angron), while another 1-2 can show up in some lists, and the rest well… just don’t really bring enough to the table. Like with the Thousand Sons and Death Guard, losing access to Marks of Chaos and Dark Pacts makes the shooting output (and also melee output) of most Chaos daemon engines and vehicles much worse but those vehicles still cost the same points-wise as they do in Chaos Space Marines. Case in point: A World Eaters Rhino costs the same as a CSM one, but while the CSM one can take the Mark of Nurgle for Sustained Hits on a 5+ or the Mark of Chaos Undivided for re-roll 1s to hit (and potentially full re-rolls with Profane Zeal), for the same cost the World Eaters Land Raider gets… +1S and +1A in melee. And while yes, it can benefit from the Blood Tithe mechanic, those effects aren’t really on par with getting an extra Lascannon hit or two every time you shoot, or just being able to become untargetable.

Because the World Eaters’ army rules primarily focus on boosting the faction’s melee output or ability to get into and survive melee, vehicles are going to be most useful to the faction when they either have suitably solid melee output of their own, can act as good transportation for other key units, or if they have enough ranged output to make up for the army’s lack of ranged firepower. As we’ll see, most vehicles just don’t get there.

Changelog

• Update: 2024-04-10 for the Q1 Dataslate and MFM
• Published: 2024-01-01

Angron

The World Eaters’ Daemon Primarch is an absolute melee monster – he has a choice of a strike or sweep attack, with the strike throwing out 8 attacks (9 on the charge) at S16, AP-4, D6+2 damage and the sweep throwing out 18 Attacks at S8 AP-2 2 damage. He’s got a 14″ Movement with FLY to help him get into combat (extra movement buffs from Blood Tithe help here), and his Wrathful Presence ability lets him pick one of the following Aura effects at the start of your Charge phase (lasting until your next Charge phase):

• Glorious Bloodletting – Friendly World Eaters units within 6″ get +1 to charge rolls. This is great, excellent force multiplier, and also helps Angron make charges out of deep strike, turning those long-shot 9+ rolls into much more manageable 8+ rolls. You’ll be using this one a lot.
• Infectious Rage – Friendly World Eaters units below Starting Strength within 6″ get +1 Attack on their melee weapons. For single-model units that means having lost one or more wounds. This is a good one for when Angron is already in combat and you just want to get an extra attack.
• Righteous Slaughter – Friendly World Eaters units within 6″ re-roll their hit rolls. This is very, very good in an edition and army where re-roll hit auras are rare. It’s a big help when it comes to making your combats more consistent… and it’s almost always going to be better than getting +1 Attack, especially on units below starting strength.

These are all pretty good, and they all have their uses, and deciding between Infectious Rage and Righteous Slaughter is pretty easy: Most of your key units hit on 3s and you just don’t have units large enough for +1 Attack per model to matter that much compared to re-rolling hit rolls. That said, +1 Attack will generally give you more upside and is going to be slightly better when you have Sustained Hits in play as you’re more likely to generate more hits. Save Infectious Rage for when you have lots of 1-loss units who need to swing for the fences.

Angron’s best trait is his durability. OK, he’s not crazy durable – he’s got T11 with a 2+/4++ save and 16 wounds and that’s not nothing – but it’s more that his Reborn in Blood ability lets him come back into reserves with full wounds every time you score a triple 6 on your Blessings of Khorne roll. It’s harder to ensure a return than it used to be with Berzerker Icons and the Favoured of Khorne Enhancement – the latter only works once per game now – but you can get decent odds of this with a Lord of Skulls. If you do get Angron back, that’s usually the ballgame – he’ll deep strike back in and use his Glorious Bloodletting aura to get an 8″ charge out of deep strike and cause all new problems.

Angron is a must-take in the World Eaters army. With 14″ Movement he’s one of your surest bets to complete a turn 1 charge if you can score Rage-Fuelled Invigoration and Unbridled Bloodlust, moving an average of 19.5″ before declaring a charge at +1 and helping a unit or two of scouting Eightbound get there as well. He also draws firepower away from your other units as he’s a threat which must be addressed.

Khorne Lord of Skulls

The weird Lord of War for the Chaos Space Marines happens to be Khorne-marked, so it’s available to World Eaters. The Lord of Skulls combines the durability of a knight (T13, 3+/5++ save with 24 wounds) with some even nastier melee potential and some pretty nasty shooting attacks designed for taking down bigger targets and really heavy infantry.

The Lord of Skulls comes with a Hades Gatling Cannon (48″ 12 shots, S8 AP-2 2 damage with Sustained Hits 1) which can be swapped for a Skullhurler (60″ 2D6 S14 AP-3 3-damage shots), plus a Gorestorm Cannon (24″ D6+3 S10 AP-2 3-damage, Blast), which you can swap for either a Daemongore Cannon (shorter range, fewer shots, AP-4 and D6+2 damage) or an Ichor Cannon (2D6 shots, AP-2, 2 damage, Blast). Basically you can kit the guy out for either killing heavy infantry or mangling vehicles and knights. If you’re taking him, give him the Skullhurler and the Daemongore Cannon – taking anything else is basically guaranteeing you’ll walk away disappointed the first time he has to shoot a vehicle and is only wounding on a 4+.

In melee the Lord of Skulls is a beast, though a bit lighter on the volume of attacks than you’d like to see. Its Great Cleaver can strike or sweep. In strike mode it has 5 attacks (so 6 on the charge), hitting on a 3+ with S16 AP-4, 8(!!) damage. On Sweep mode it throws out 15 attacks hitting on a 3+ at S8, AP-2, 2 damage. But while that damage number is very scary, the combination of 5 attacks and WS 3+ makes it a little scarier than you’d like when it comes to taking on bigger targets. Against most vehicles with a 2+ save and no invlun it’ll average two unsaved wounds to push through 16 damage, but its odds of taking down a knight in one go are a bit longer. That said giving it Sustained or Lethal Hits will go a long way to making sure it just blows through whatever target it’s engaged with.

The Lord of Skulls’ ability is Blessed Slaughter, which lets you modify one die on your Blessings of Khorne roll for each enemy unit it destroyed in the previous battle round, either by +1 or -1. That’s a pretty great little bonus for a unit that’s likely to score some kills thanks to the sheer weight of its firepower and melee weapons. It’s a big part of what makes the Lord Skulls competitively viable now that it’s a reasonably costed unit, as those are the best odds you’ll get to bring back Angron.

There are two major problems with the Lord of Skulls: The first is that it only moves 8″. It’s just nowhere near as fast as the rest of the army, and that means getting into melee with it is surprisingly difficult – you’re going to send a number of other units screaming past it, tearing into enemy targets ahead of it, and likely clearing out those targets before it can reach them. The Lord or Skulls really wants to be tearing up enemy vehicles and knights but those aren’t really the kinds of armies that give World Eaters trouble. It can also put a hurt on something like Plague Marines, but the flip side is that a Death Guard army can chip away at it with PBCs and then finish it off with grenades and plague fists if the charge first. That said, if it does get to them first it’ll sweep an entire squad away with ease on the charge.

The Q1 dataslate dropped the cost of the Lord of Skulls substantially while making the Favoured of Khorne enhancement worse. As a result, he’s become a very strong option in competitive World Eaters lists, acting as a dual threat alongside Angron and part of a nice one-two punch: Angron charges forward and causes problems early and dies, and while they had to deal with him the Lord of Skulls is still around and able to kill a few units and revive Angron. He’s tall enough to see over some terrain with his axe, and he’s a real pain to remove if you aren’t kitted out for shooting down knights.

World Eaters Daemon Prince

The World Eaters Daemon Prince offers a relatively quick (8″ move), durable (T10, 2+/4++ save, 10W) melee combatant (6A, S10 AP-2, 3 damage in strike mode) who gains Devastating Wounds on the charge. That’s pretty good, but the real value he brings is his Infernal Fortitude (Aura) ability, which gives friendly Infantry units within 6″ a 6+ invulnerable save, or a 4+ if they already had a 5+. This is huge for Jakhals and solid for Khorne Berzerkers, who otherwise lack an invuln, and it’s pretty solid on Eightbound as well given you’ll want to protect them from higher-AP firepower. The catch is his cost, but if you’re taking him it’s likely to help turn a couple units of Jakhals into a real tarpit. He shows up occasionally in successful competitive lists.

World Eaters Daemon Prince with Wings

This guy on the other hand does not have the 4+ invulnerable save aura nor does he get Devastating wounds. Instead he causes battle-shock tests on the charge (lame) and at the start of the battle he can pick one enemy unit to re-roll hits and wound rolls against. that’s OK but neither of these is good enough to merit bringing this guy to a game, especially at 195 points.

World Eaters Defiler

Like other Defilers, the World Eaters Defiler is relatively mediocre at fighting (though marginally better than other variants) and shooting (though worse than the CSM variant), and has no special abilities unique to its faction. It’s massively overcosted at 190 points compared to the Daemon Prince, mostly because you’re paying for some shooting attacks you don’t really need.

World Eaters Forgefiend

The World Eaters have the worst variant of the Forgefiend, forcing infantry units hit by its attacks to take a Battle-shock test, the worst ability of its faction variants. Its output isn’t good enough to be worth taking as ranged support for your units.

World Eaters Helbrute

The World Eaters Helbrute isn’t any faster or tougher than other Helbrutes, but it is nastier in melee, enough so that you might consider taking one as a fringe/edge unit. It has the standard Helbrute melee options but the real comedy comes from its Frenzy ability, which lets it shoot as if it were your Shooting phase or Fight as if it were the Fight phase every time it’s targeted by enemy attacks. Now mostly that just means your opponent will avoid attacking it when doing so would be a bad idea but it’s still pretty great the one or two times it happens. Regardless of the Twin-linked ability you’ll get better offensive output out of Fist+Scourge in melee, but the ability to go dual heavy flamers can push dual fists over the top. Though Fist + twin Lascannon is probably the slightly better play just because it lets you get some ranged support. The Helbrute doesn’t really show up in serious lists but at 140 points it’s not so expensive that if you want to take one for laughs it’ll hamstring you too badly.

World Eaters Heldrake

None of the Heldrakes are good enough to be worth taking and the World Eaters variant is no exception. Its special ability is being able to do mortal wounds to an enemy unit it moves over in the Movement phase and it can fight more effectively against Flying units, but given those usually HOVER anyways and also you have Angron to punch them out of the sky if they don’t, it’s not something you really need.

World Eaters Land Raider

The World Eaters Land Raider is just a regular Land Raider but its value comes from being able to hold Berzerkers and Eightbound and have units charge out of them after it moves. They’re pretty expensive at 240 points so you don’t really see them in successful lists but they’re just good enough to be borderline if you want to build a strategy around taking two of them full of Berzerkers. They don’t really want to carry Eightbound as you’d rather have those units make their Scout moves, and with only 10″ Movement you’d be slowing them down if those units want to Advance and Charge.

World Eaters Maulerfiend

On the other hand the Maulerfiend has a bit more going for it, since it specializes in something where the faction and Detachment abilities actually provide value. That said, he’s just a big melee threat in an army that already has plenty of melee threats to go around, and faster ones to boot. At 155 points he’s not terribly expensive but it is taking the place of a unit of Eightbound and ultimately the Eightbound just do more for you, in part because they can move through walls.

The World Eaters Maulerfiend is one of those sad models that feels like it should be good enough – its Scent of Blood ability to get +2 on charges and +1 to hit against units below Starting Strength is pretty good – but ultimately successful lists are already just fully loaded up on Eightbound and Berzerkers and don’t have room for a Maulerfiend – at best he’s usually fighting for a spot with the Daemon Prince and losing.

World Eaters Predators

The World Eaters have access to two Predator variants, the anti-Vehicle Annihilator and the anti-Infantry Destructor. They’re OK but neither does anything the World Eaters really need. That said, there was one successful list that ran them back in mid-October, with three Destructors and two Daemon Princes, though no one else has seen success with a similar list since.

World Eaters Rhino

Rhinos are a great and necessary unit in World Eaters armies, primarily because they protect and transport Berzerkers, and you’re going to be running a lot of those. There really isn’t a ton more to say about them. Use them to get your Berzerkers to their targets, then drop them on objectives and use Blood Offering when they’re destroyed to make an objective sticky. Hold your troops inside until they need to come out, as your Berzerkers can be pretty fragile against heavy indirect fire from the likes of Basilisks, PBCs, and Exorcists.

Final Thoughts

If you’re building Vanella’s World Eaters list – the current hotness – you’re going to be taking Angron and two Rhinos to carry your Berzerkers and that’s about it from this list. If you want to get a bit more creative well, Daemon Princes, Maulerfiends, and Land Raiders offer some more fringe options to consider. But at the end of the day your strategy is still going to be about tearing your opponent apart in melee and the units which help you do that better.

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