Editing Warhammer 40,000/9th Edition Tactics/Thousand Sons (section)

===Troops===
*'''Chaos Cultists:''' Your cheap choice. Cultists can be set for melee or range without paying extra points, which is nice. Flamers make them somewhat more reliable, while Heavy Stubbers are a cheap and useful upgrade if you plan to camp objectives with them. They have some problems though, with poor leadership and the ability to die to a stray fart. They're doing best when the opponent forgets they exist, so try not to mention them. Also, Games Workshop tacitly approved the use of Age of Sigmar's Tzeentch Arcanites as flavourful Thousand Sons Cultists with some art in the codex (just base them on a 25mm base, or use them as Tzaangors). Use these if you want them to look more like someone who might have come from Sortiarius. Cultists no longer gain Objective Secured for Thousand Sons so their use is dramatically diminished, but they are still the cheapest troop choice you can take if you're looking to save points. 
**RAW, also gains benefits from AoC, so put them in cover and watch them shrug Heavy Bolters. [[Derp|It makes sense, trust me]]. 
** Can be used to wrap enemy vehicles into position, but Tzaangors have bigger bases (so need fewer models to do it) and are much better at getting stuck in.
** Frankly outmatched by Tzaangors in almost every way except raw point price. They completely lack an invul save, are worse in melee, and have worse toughness. Unless your thought is to somehow utilize their autoguns and range, just take a Tzaangor unless you can only afford 50 points and not 70 points.
*'''[[Rubric Marines]]:''' Once unusable, these guys have become pretty good. They have their usual loadout of Inferno Boltguns (AP-2 bolters) which they can replace with Warpflamers (AP-2 flamers) for maximum hurt at worse range, and the Aspiring Sorcerer has a Force Staff and an Inferno Bolt Pistol (AP-2 bolt pistol), Plasma Pistol, or Warpflame Pistol (AP-2 hand flamer). One Rubric can take a Soulreaper Cannon (24" Heavy 5 S6 AP-3 D1, no penalty to hit for moving and shooting cos you're a Rubric), and one (which can be the same one) can take an Icon of Flame for making 1 more Cabal Point. The Aspiring Sorcerer is a fully fledged Psyker (normal Smites!) who knows one spell from the Discipline of Change or Vengeance on top of the Cult spell he knows, giving him a massive list of spells to choose from when you add him to your army (on the the table he only has 1 cast). If you take a few 5 man squads (or even 10 man and some Scarabs), you're going to find yourself casting a ''lot'' of psychic powers - which is exactly how it should be! 
**As of the 06.22 Points changes, Icons of Flame are free, and Warpflamers are even cheaper at 3 points. The free additional Cabal Point on each of your rubric squads is a god send, because Cabal Points make you less reliant on Command Points. 
**Their "All is Dust" rule gives them (including the Sorcerer) +1 to armour saves if the attack's characteristic is D1 (does nothing against d3, or Mortals) , giving them a 2+ save against small arms fire; combined with armor of contempt, that it'll take AP-3 to start denting your armor. Of course, since your opponent can fix this with either AP or D2, staying in cover is still a very good idea.
**You generally want the soulreaper cannon, which is an auto-include at 5 points for 24" Heavy 5 S6 AP-3 D1, since All is Dust means you'll take no penalty for moving and shooting.
** Do remember that you will still need to be stationary (or spend 1CP) to double tap with your bolters when at distances greater than 12", but if you're going full warpflamer squad, always advance with the rubrics since they will auto-hit, and you weren't going to charge into melee anyways.  The only reason not to advance with a ''full'' flamer unit is if you gave the sorcerer a warpflame pistol, as he can't shoot it after advancing.  If you do grab a warpflame pistol (and you should, as it's far and away the sorcerer's most efficient gun on top of being free), consider a soulreaper cannon despite the flamer spam - it'll outshoot the flamers against pretty much everything in the game.
** Compared to Scarab Occult Terminators, the Rubrics have worse melee output per point, slightly worse bolter output per point (although both units have garbage output per point just using their (unbuffed) inferno bolters), no ability to deep strike innately, and worse wounds per model (more wounds per point, though) and a worse armor save (same invuln save, though). However, they are able to generate more cabal points in both absolute and relative terms with the icon of flame, can steal objectives from other troops more easily due to being cheaper, and can bring warpflamers in large numbers which the Scarabs can't (in fact, the only way to have Scarabs out-shoot Rubricae is to make the contest happen outside of 12" - 3 warpflamers, a warpflame pistol/Incandaeum, and an SrC simply outshoots Scarabs against anything in range). Scarabs are better in a fair number of situations, but don't let that make you think it invalidates Rubricae.
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<tab name="Ardent Automata (Upgrade)">
If your unit is carrying out any objective actions, you can also have them fire as well. For 15 points/+1 PL, this is way too situational to even consider. Even if it were half the price, that just goes to a "maybe".
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<tab name="Protégé (Upgrade)">
The sorcerer knows an additional power. This is pretty neat, and 5 points/+1 PL you might as well take it. Keep in mind that he'll have 3 by default (Smite, Cult, and chosen) and can still only cast 1, so be careful to not dump a bunch of points on him that you can't make use of.  May be better used on a Scarab Occult Sorcerer.
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<tab name="Rites of Coalescence (Upgrade)">
One of your rubricae regains all his wounds each command phase for 10 points/+1 PL. ''Significantly'' better on a Scarab Occult Sorcerer.
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*'''[[Beastmen (40k)#Tzaangors.2C Beastmen of Tzeentch| Tzaangors]]''' - 70 points for a unit of 10 close combat chaff that are just as tough as Space Marines, have a 5++ invulnerable save, 2A (3 on the Twistbray) with either AP-1 on the melee attacks or an autopistol, a 10 point instrument that adds 1 to their Advance and Charge rolls, and a 5 point banner for re-rolling Morale Tests on their Ld of 7. These guys are alright for Thousand Sons armies that need lots of fodder to protect their big guns in the back. Pistols/Chainswords look cool but are inferior to Tzaangor Blades, as AP-1 makes them dangerous to almost everything in the game (apart from Daemons).
**These guys are 1/3 the cost of Rubrics, but you get no armour save, half the wounds, and no morale immunity, and non-existent ranged output.  On the other hand, they have better melee output.  If literally all you need is something to sit on a backfield objective and obstinately exist, these guys can handle it ok.
**May or may not be getting better with the upcoming Army of Renown built explicitly around Tzaangor hordes.