Pactbound Zealots: The 11th-Edition Chaos Space Marines Marks of Chaos Detachment

When mustering, every Heretic Astartes unit that is not an Epic Hero and does not already have one must take a Mark keyword and note it on your Army Roster: Khorne, Tzeentch, Nurgle, Slaanesh or Chaos Undivided. You cannot select Khorne for a Psyker unit.

Then, each time a marked unit gains a weapon ability from a Dark Pact and does not fail the resulting Leadership test, it gains a further ability for the phase:

• Units that took [LETHAL HITS] — Khorne scores Critical Hits on unmodified melee Hit rolls of 5+; Tzeentch on ranged 5+; Chaos Undivided re-rolls Hit rolls of 1.
• Units that took [SUSTAINED HITS 1] — Nurgle scores Critical Hits on ranged 5+; Slaanesh on melee 5+; Chaos Undivided re-rolls Hit rolls of 1.

So the Mark decides which half of the pact menu is worth taking. A Khorne melee brick wants Lethal Hits; a Nurgle gun line wants Sustained Hits. Chaos Undivided is the hedge that works either way.

Faction Pack v1.2 tightened the Restrictions, and this is the part that changes list-building. A CHARACTER or EPIC HERO unit can only be attached to a unit if both share a Mark, and a new bullet adds that a unit can only embark within, or start the battle embarked within, a Transport if both share a Mark. Plan your Marks and your Rhinos together.

Six, and four of them care which Mark the target carries.

• Profane Zeal (Shooting or Fight) — a Chaos Undivided unit re-rolls Wound rolls. The reason to leave a squad unmarked in spirit.
• Eternal Hate (Fight) — destroyed models in a targeted unit fight anyway on a D6 roll of 4+, +1 for a Khorne unit.
• Skinshift (Command) — heal 3 wounds, and if the unit is Tzeentch and below Starting Strength, return a destroyed non-Character model at full wounds.
• Torpefying Refrain (Movement) — charge after Falling Back, upgraded for a Slaanesh unit to shoot and charge after Advancing or Falling Back.
• Festering Miasma (opponent's Shooting) — Stealth, and a Nurgle unit can only be shot from within 18 inches.
• Eye of the Gods (Fight) — a non-Epic-Hero Character that destroys an enemy unit gains permanent +1 Move, Toughness and Wounds and +1 Attacks, Strength and Damage on its melee weapons.

Eye of the Gods is the one to plan around: it is the only permanent upgrade in the detachment, so line up a character kill early.

All four are gated on a Mark, which is unusual and means your enhancement choice and your Mark choice are the same decision.

• Eye of Tzeentch (15 pts) — Tzeentch only: a Dark Pact Leadership result of 8 or more gains 1CP.
• Talisman of Burning Blood (15 pts) — Khorne only: +1 Attack and +1 Strength on the bearer's melee weapons, replaced by a D3 on a successful pact.
• Intoxicating Elixir (15 pts) — Slaanesh only: Feel No Pain 5+, plus a Battle-shock test on a unit it hits after a successful pact.
• Orbs of Unlife (15 pts) — Nurgle only: at the end of the Fight phase, D3 mortal wounds on a 4+ to each enemy unit within 3 inches, with +1 to the roll after a successful pact.

(Points come from the Munitorum Field Manual and move with updates; confirm in the app.)

• Legionaries — the flexible Battleline block, and the unit most affected by the new shared-Mark Transport restriction.
• Chosen — volume of attacks, which is what turns Critical Hits on 5+ into real damage.
• Possessed — high-Attack melee models that cash in a Khorne or Slaanesh trigger hard.
• Chaos Lord — attachment now requires a shared Mark, so mark your characters to match the units they lead.
• Abaddon the Despoiler — the pack rewrote his Dark Destiny ability so a Dark Pact Leadership result of 7 or more gains 1CP, which pays for the detachment's stratagem habit.
• Chaos Rhino — a Rhino and its passengers must now share a Mark, so it is a list-building constraint, not just transport.

Take it when you want the core Chaos Space Marines experience with no theme commitment: power armour, Dark Pacts and reliable damage out of whatever you already own. It is the most forgiving detachment in the faction and the easiest place to learn pact timing.

The honest counter-argument is the 3-DP price. At 2,000 points it fills your whole budget, which means giving up Devotees of Destruction or Cabal of Chaos, and the new Restrictions add real friction: a mis-marked character cannot join the unit you built it for, and a mis-marked Rhino cannot carry the squad you bought it for.

Sample gameplan: mark your main melee brick Khorne and your gun line Nurgle, and leave a flexible squad Chaos Undivided for Profane Zeal. Pact for Lethal Hits with the Khorne unit and Sustained Hits with the Nurgle unit. Hold Eternal Hate for the counter-charge, spend Festering Miasma when the gun line gets targeted, and look for an early character kill so Eye of the Gods pays for the rest of the game.