Chaos and Thousand Sons dominate packed 40k weekend tournaments

Crab Battle pt.2 is not just another weekend recap. It captures a packed competitive window where Chaos pressure, especially Defilers, kept shaping pairings and deployment, while Thousand Sons turned that pressure into results. Goonhammer’s own read of the weekend was blunt: Thousand Sons are dominating right now with a range of builds, and that matters far beyond one trophy.

A stacked weekend from Virginia to Moscow

The event slate alone tells you how deep 40k’s competitive calendar has become. That same weekend included The Richmond Open 40K Event in Doswell, Virginia, plus the BAJIO Open, Grand Onslaught 12, the Corsair Open Grand Tournament, Green Dice Games’ WWAAAGGGHHHH before the Wedding event, Grand Tournoi 40K, San Diego Classic Grand Tournament, and Moscow GT. This was not a single hot pocket of local results, it was a broad cross-section of the scene, spread across countries, formats, and player bases.

That breadth matters because it gives real context to the meta talk. If multiple tournaments are all feeding the same conversation, then the faction trends are not just isolated spikes from one room or one mission pack. The weekend’s story is that Chaos is still setting the tempo, and Thousand Sons are the faction most clearly cashing that check.

Richmond Open was the clearest proof point

The sharpest public result came out of the Richmond Open 40K Event, a 161-player, five-round Grand Tournament held May 2-3, 2026 at The Meadow Event Hall in Doswell, Virginia. The event sat inside the Richmond Open convention weekend at 13191 Dawn Boulevard, and the packet made the stakes obvious: this was a Road to NOVA Orange Ticket event and a double Games Workshop World Championships of Warhammer qualifier. It used 2000-point Strike Force games, 3-hour rounds, and a prize slate that included Best Overall, Best Painted, Best in Imperium, Chaos and Xenos, Best Sport, Wooden Spoon, and five GW codex codes.

The convention itself was in its fifth year and billed as a community-led tabletop gathering, with miniatures gaming, historical wargaming, RPGs, board games, vendors, and open gaming. That combination of serious competition and broad hobby appeal is exactly why results like this matter, because they reflect a field big enough to punish sloppy lists and reward well-rounded plans.

The podium tells the story cleanly. TJ Lanigan took first with Thousand Sons, Jeffrey Kolodner finished second with Adepta Sororitas, and Mike Robertson took third with T’au Empire. Best Coast Pairings lists Lanigan’s round scores as 94, 97, 76, 83, and 80, Kolodner’s as 76, 95, 95, 91, and 96, and Robertson’s as 91, 91, 81, 89, and 82. Those numbers point to a field where consistency mattered as much as raw ceiling, and each of the top lists had to keep scoring under pressure all weekend.

Why Thousand Sons look durable, not like a one-week spike

Lanigan’s winning build was a Grand Coven MSU Thousand Sons list, and the shape of it is what makes the result interesting. The list leans on Magnus alongside a broad spread of Rubrics and wizards, using concentrated firepower to pick apart threats while still scoring efficiently. That is a classic control plan, but the important part is that it is not locked into one gimmick. It is a faction-wide toolkit that can be tuned around different opponents and missions.

That aligns with Goonhammer’s broader read that Thousand Sons are dominating with a whole range of builds. When a faction wins with one build but also shows up as a family of viable lists, that usually signals something more durable than a one-off spike. If you are choosing an army right now, that is the real warning sign: Thousand Sons are not only strong, they are flexible enough to keep showing up in different hands and different meta pockets.

What the other podium lists say about the counters

Jeffrey Kolodner’s second-place Adepta Sororitas list matters because it shows the kind of army that can still punish a chaos-heavy field. The article frames it as a go-wide build in a rough meta, and that is the kind of profile that can stress Thousand Sons if it spreads the board, controls objectives, and forces the Sons player to spend resources inefficiently. In a weekend where control armies were thriving, a well-timed Sisters list still found room to compete at the very top.

Mike Robertson’s third-place T’au Empire list points to another useful counter. This was described as a patient shooting army built around relocating and deleting key threats, which is exactly the sort of plan that can keep pace with elite infantry and mid-board pressure if the movement phase is clean. T’au do not want to brawl into the center and hope for the best. They want angles, spacing, and the ability to pick up the right unit at the right time.

Those two podium lists are a useful reminder that Thousand Sons are strong, but not untouchable. The answer is not always to out-damage them head-on. Often it is to force them into bad trades, deny clean angles, and make their high-value activations work harder than they want.

What you should test before your next RTT

If you are packing an army for your next RTT, this weekend gives you a practical checklist:

• Test into Defiler-style pressure. Chaos is still shaping the board, so you need a plan for durable mid-board threats that can bully space and force awkward movement.

• Practice into Thousand Sons control. Magnus, Rubrics, and layered psychic support can punish loose positioning, so your screening and threat priority need to be tight.

• Build for scoring under pressure. Lanigan’s win and Kolodner’s near-miss both show that the best lists are still earning points while trading, not just tabling.

• Respect mobile shooting. Robertson’s T’au finish shows that a patient, repositioning gunline can still make top tables if it deletes the right units and stays disciplined.

The big takeaway from Crab Battle pt.2 is simple: Chaos is still setting the tone, but Thousand Sons are the faction translating that tone into repeated results. If you are tuning lists for the next event, the safest assumption is that this is not just a one-week flare-up. It is a meta shift with enough depth to keep demanding answers.