So we've played about 6 times now and I've played the Space Marines 4 times and the Eldar twice. We played with 4 players each time. It sure seems like the Chaos Space Marines are the best of the lot. Dread Ritual just seems broken. By turn three, you could be getting a 5 Materiel unit for free! That's almost as much as some people were producing. No one has an ability that's even close to this.

At first, I thought the fact that he had to purchase Cultists was a disadvantage, but you need guys to hold planets and they can jump through the warp to take adjacent systems that are uncontrolled.

Maybe it was the fact that I was playing the Space Marines (which some say is the weakest of the races), but it just seems like an extra 4+ build per turn is pretty powerful.

Has anyone else come to this conclusion?

Thanks...

Those cultists need to be in the sector the player is building, but yeah, it's quite powerful. I've found it most useful for fortifying new forges. The chaos marines power comes from being able to do pretty much any strategy but not as well as the other races. I call them FS's little cheaters but not to the point where I feel they're broken.

Well, it's like this as far as I've seen. CSM goes for the moral victory in combat and spreads rapidly due to combat abilities. That is what it does well. Other than that there is nothing special. Eldar are fast and rule the space, marines can hit reasonably hard and take more hits than anyone and orcs just hit so hard it's hilarious. Since CSM can not really compete in any other field, it has to have something to counter the others with.

Honestly, once any of the others get their game going in 2vs2, CSM will just die off. In all other modes people can scheme between themselves and ruin CSMs or any other factions day. So, it's balanced. You just can not leave the CSM doing what it does best and the same goes with everyone else too.