Cultist

"WE ARE KHAYOS, KHAYOS IS STRONG!"

– A Cultist of the Dark Gods. Yes they pronounce it like that.

FOR KHAOSSSS!!!

Cultists AKA Dregs, Cannon Fodder, Chaos Munchies, Whining Bitches, Annoying Squeakers, Edgy Fuckers and Khorne Berserker meatshields are the ragtag team/army of renegade humans, Imperial Guardsmen or peasants who have forsaken the Imperium in turn of having the freedom of indulging in extra heretical pleasure. They are considered as the eviler and spikier counterparts to the Imperial Guard. While they have smaller balls than their loyal brethren, they are still larger than the Chaos Space Marines.

(Despite being the lowliest cannon fodder of Chaos they can be dangerous. Billions of Cultists are enough to exterminate even First Founding Chapters as it was almost the fate of the Blood Angels)

Chaos Cultists are diverse and range from Iron Maiden lookalikes to BDSM Dark Eldar wannabes, worshipping either Chaos as a whole, a particular Chaos God, or none of the above.

Overview

All planets and civilizations belonging to the Imperium can harbor Chaos organisations, which themselves are as diverse in practice and membership as is imaginable. From the blood-soaked sacrificial cults of feral worlds to the philosophical secret societies of more advanced worlds, the temptations of Chaos can capture all. Indeed, according to the Ordo Hereticus, Chaos Cults can arise from any class of Imperial society, be it impoverished, noble, hive-gang, Abhuman, soldiers, or Mutant.

At first glance they are indistinguishable from normal men, but under their clothes, the flesh is tattooed and branded with sigils that hurt the eyes of any faithful who look upon them. When the Chaos Space Marines come to a planet, the true colours of the Cultists are revealed. The more grotesquely mutated among them, the so-called "Accursed Cultist Mutants", are far more conspicuous, and the leaders of such squads are often just a few steps away from devolving into an Unnameable Beast.

The objective of the Chaos cult is to survive and eventually dominate the society. Mere survival is particularly important on Imperial worlds, where Chaos worship is the greatest of heresies and Inquisitors are always vigilant and ready to wipe out any taint of Chaos.

Generally clandestine in nature, as discovery could bring with it attention from local Arbites all the way up to the Inquisition, cults often hide behind the front of some form of legitimate organization in their attempt to accumulate local or planetary power, such as trade unions, charitable organizations, accepted religious groups and even local variants of the Imperial Cult. By extension, any honest folk which try to form said organization for real might end up burned at the stake because an inquisitor has a lot on his plate and would rather be safe than sorry.

Extreme political organizations make good fronts for cults, as they naturally attract power-hungry and mentally unbalanced individuals, which make particularly good material for potential cult members. A very successful organization can gain real political power, even gaining enough power to make it possible for the cult to become the governing body of the planet without having to resort to rebellion.

After taking root, and as it expands in power and influence, eventually the cult may end up effectively ruling anything from a township to an entire planet. Eventually, an uprising breaks out, either on purpose or because the cult has grown too large and/or unruly to remain secret any longer. At this point, the cult can be expected to summon aid from their Chaotic masters, ranging from incurring daemonic possession to summoning the Traitor Legions. Cults may also begin to rebel in concert with an invasion of Chaos Marines. The ultimate aim of the cult's uprising is to overthrow the Imperial government and attain direct control of the world. After the conflict, cultists are often taken back into the Eye of Terror where they either join the damned population of a Daemon World or are formed up into a Chaos Warlord's armed forces.

There are many types of Cults, all of which can be seen here.

Equipment

The Chaos Cultists are garbed in ragged cloaks, macabre masks and sinister-looking hoods, and display an array of intricate features from studs and straps to daggers, wires and pouches. Cultists often carry a mixture of primitive close combat weapons and ranged weapons, including spiked flails/mace, swords, axes, warhammers, spears/halberds and knives, alongside flintlock pistols, muskets, blunderbusses, stub guns, sawn-off shotguns (Including their pump-action cousins), stub rifles, Crossbows, RPGs, autoguns and autopistols, as civilian populaces rarely have access to armouries until after the uprising has succeeded. They also, on occasion, carry a bunch of Frags, Kraks or Incendiary Charges to start a riot. A notable exception to this being when PDF troops join the fray, with or without their superiors' knowledge. Occasionally, Imperial Guard regiments turn as well. Backed by their probably also heretical home system with a Hellforge, a Hive World and an Agri World, these make the deadliest available cultists. Any such grand prize of a relatively functional Chaos worshipping star system will also invariably be under joint patronage of Heretic Astartes and Dark Mechanicus.

Variants

Thanks to Darktide, we now have some variants of Cultists which are called Dregs in the game. These are:

Dreg Shotgunner

A Dreg Shotgunner, AKA target practice.

Like their more militant counterpart, Dreg Shotgunners specializes in charging-in and going in close to shove their boomstick up the enemy's asshole. They all carry around Combat Shotguns with an affixed bayonet to the front.

Unlike the Scab Shotgunner, the Dreg garden variety is more common than usual. Nevertheless, despite their commonality, they still share the same retarded AI as their Scab cousins. That is, the tactic of slowly walking up in front of the player without taking any form of cover or tactics. Dreg Shotgunners are even easier to take down than their Scab counterparts, owing to the fact that only their chest is protected by flak armor leaving their limbs and head exposed, only compensating for this weakness with their abundant numbers.

However one shouldn't really underestimate them, as their numbers means that they are able to pressure and corner players allowing them to relentlessly blast enemies with their high damage shotgun until they drop dead, or an ally comes in to save the day. Nevertheless, like their Scab counterparts, despite being listed as 'elite' enemies, they behave more like up jumped cannon fodder and should be treated as such.

They are identifiable by their robes and sickly yellow cloak adorned with a mantle of spikes and skulls on their back making them easily identifiable. But overall, there is nothing too much to write home about for these guys. Grab a gun and cap their sorry asses.

• 

  Scab and Dreg Shotgunners

Dreg Gunner

A face only an inbred mother would love.

Like their more militant counterpart, Dreg Gunners are in charge of displaying an overwhelming amount of firepower in the general direction, in order to provide covering fire for their meatshields allies. Unlike their more militant cousins who are well-off with more modern weapons, Dreg Gunners are forced to rely on older, stripped-down Heavy Stubbers for their weaponry.

Compared to the Scab Gunner which offers relatively 'accurate' laser fire in the form of their Hotshot Volley Guns, Dreg Gunners use their Heavy Stubbers to spray and pray that their bullets hit something. As such, whilst more inaccurate than their Scab cousins, the Dregs does not need a pause in their fire and will just continue to press the trigger until it runs out of bullets and need to reload. Additionally due to the lack of a laser trail, and their similar appearance to the rest of the dregs they than can occasionally be harder to spot compared to their Scab counterparts.

In terms of their AI, they share a lot with their Scab counterparts. It is relatively simplistic, consisting of just aiming and shooting. At least they share the common sense in firing their weapons from afar, behind a mob of Poxwalkers and taking the occasional cover as a result. They are therefore, one of the more balanced enemies in the game, offering a degree of difficulty without going into Bullshit territory unlike some enemies in the game.

Like the rest of the cult, Dreg Gunners can be identified by their sickly yellow robes/clothing, additionally they are adorned with pieces of flak armor around their chest and shoulders providing them with some protection albeit sparse, while less armored than their scab counterpart they have higher health to compensate for the shortcomings of their armor, however they are still easy to take out when not hiding behind cover or other units.

• 

Dreg Rager

Just one less skull of being mistaken for a Khornate Jakhal.

The goddamned Khornate cultist in a Nurglite-heavy game. The Dreg Rager is a Cultist so amped up on Drugs that he goes loco in a trance like a budget Eversor Assassin. These guys wield a wide variety of RIP AND TEAR including Mauls, Swords, Axes, and Warhammers, alongside their own flavours of Chain Cleavers, Pulverizers, Axe-Rakes and Saw Blades.

In terms of gameplay, these guys are actually more dangerous than their more militant counterpart as they are fast, tough and could swing their dual-weapons so damn fast you would think you're fighting against a Khorne Berserker. They are very dangerous in close combat, and their strength in quickly recovering from most staggering effects makes them even more lethal in CQC.

They are definitely one of those mooks you don't want to fuck with as even an Ogryn would find it hard press in dealing against these guys. The safest option when dealing with them is to take them out from range, as this allows you to avoid their troublesome melee attacks. They come in both armoured and unarmoured variety, although it barely makes a gameplay difference.

• 

  The unarmoured variety.

Dreg Tox Flamer

To this day, Mortarion is perplexed on how a bunch of mortals manage to get his ingrediants to make Alchem weapons.

Possibly the most dangerous of the lot. The Dreg Tox Flamer like their militant counterparts, act as the close-range orientated shocktroops in Darktide. However, compared to the more vanilla counterparts, the Dreg Tox is far, far more dangerous as they wield the deadly Alchem Flamer.

It is interesting to note how Nurglite Cultists in Darktide manage to gain a special weapon that used to be exclusive to the Death Guard, these Alchem Flamers have a notoriety for being god damned nasty to both the user and the target. How they manage to gain the know-how to create these toxic weapons is unknown given that they came from the Death Guard in the Horus Heresy/Great Crusade days.

Anyways, in terms of gameplay, they act the same as the normal counterparts, with the exception being that their greenish chem flamers lasts far longer than normal, making them a rare exception of being more dangerous than the official soldiers-turned-traitors. Therefore, it is best to deal with them at a longer range to avoid their nasty ass chem-fire effects, astute players will hear them coming before even seeing them due to the iconic sound of a clicking pilot light signifying their arrival onto the field.

Fortunately, their deadliness of their weapons is offset by the fact that, like all cultists, they wear minimal armour, unfortunately however they are considered "maniacs" allowing them to take less stagger from small arms meaning that once they get burning the only thing that will stop them is death, melee weapons, and some beefier ranged options.

• 

Jakhal

The World Eaters manage to have their own cutlists, these guys being a bunch of chainsword-wielding lunatics hopped up on a special cocktail of combat drugs. While led by champions, they also employ Dishonoured, even bigger and roid-ragier than the rest and carrying around massive weapons called Skullsmashers.

Alternative Modeling Options

It's almost a shame that cultists are so disposable, because when it comes to modeling, converting, and proxies, cultists have the capacity to be some of the most characterful units in a Chaos army, even more so than the marines, as Cultists offer almost complete creative freedom with what they can be. Humans, mutants, xenos, whatever, if it's roughly human-sized and either has or can be fitted with a basic weapon, it'll work. Chaos has never been picky about what they use as lasbolt catchers, and cultists can represent that to the fullest.

Naturally, two of the most common/accessible cultist alternatives are inevitably Beastmen and Skaven models from Warhammer Fantasy. And with the return of Necromunda, the cultist options have expanded even more like Jakhals. The Genestealer Cult models also come with a variety of different weapons that can be used when creating chaos cultists.

Pete The Wargamer has a series of videos showing how to kitbash your own cultists themed around the different traitor legions, check them out [here].

In Dawn of War

One of the biggest glow ups in 40k gaming history right here

Dawn of War 1

"We will serve you... [inhale] and in return, heheeh... grant us the power of the dark gods!"

– Cultists being a little too optimistic on their chances

In Dawn of War, Cultists are the basic scout unit/cannon fodder of the CSM (that's short for Chaos Space Marine) faction, able to go invisible and detect cloaked units, but are also Squishy as hell (pun not intended). While they are pitifully weak, once they get upgrades with a Chaos Space Marine leader and grenade heavy weapons, you can kiss your ass goodbye (that is until an assault unit gets close and they're murdered in seconds as despite being a choppy scout unit; they fold like wet paper against everything else.). They appear to use a heretical variation of the standard Imperial Laspistol, but it's so fucking weak that they're better off just screaming Chaaaaaaaaarge! (Skip to 2:00) into their enemies' faces. They're also the cheapest and most numerous (spammy) unit you can field in any CSM army, so much like in tabletop, you can also use them as a squealing meatshield for your heavy hitters.

They are infamous for their high-squeak voices sounding more in line with a constipated Mickey Mouse. Their hilarious voice acting and general weak sauce makes them prime fuel for meme-baits and also birthed this adorable monstrosity.

"Aaaaugh, My Spleen!"

Dawn of War 2

"I BURN WITH DARK FAITH!"

– DoW II Cultist being cooler than their DoW I counterparts.

Dawn of War 2 took out the iconic "FOR KHAOSSS!!!!" voice with a much more grittier and manlier voice. Ironically the voice acting made the Cultists more manly than the Imperial Guard. Their weaponry matches their voice acting, as they come with close combat weapons and SUICIDE BOMBS by default and can be upgraded with grenade launchers and autoguns for maximum Lulz. They also became more useful with the ability to build a ritual shrine for each of the chaos gods that suppresses enemies, shoots magic missiles, or spawns short lived bloodletter fodder respectively.

"No! My fingers! My fingers are gone!"

See Also

• Khornholio - He wants tippy for his chaotic bunghole. The most infamous Cultist to date. Originated from the hammy voice acting in Dawn of War: Soulstorm.
• Cultist-Chan- Another famous Cultist originating, yet again from the bizarre accent of the Dawn of War 1 Cultists.
• Lost and the Damned - When Cultists get their shit together and fight on par with the Imperial Guard.

Gallery

• 

  Looks like an Edgy Fucker but sounds like a shrill squeaky cartoon henchman

• 
• 
• 
•