1500 Quasi-Competitive Daemons

[Brother Muninn]

40K Army: Chaos Daemons

I haven't been having a lot of luck with my current Daemons list, so I'm trying to devise something a bit more competitive. Something to work towards over the course of the summer (in hopes that the plastic Plaguebearers rumors come true *hope hope hope*). Here's what I've come up with this evening, and I'm wonder if it's viable without giving itself over to cheese.

HQ
Fateweaver
Herald of Tzeentch
* Chariot
* We are Legion
* Master of Sorcery
* Bolt of Tzeentch
Herald of Tzeentch
* Chariot
* We are Legion
* Master of Sorcery
* Bolt of Tzeentch

ELITES
Bloodcrushers (3)
* Fury of Khorne
* Instrument
Bloodcrushers (3)
* Fury of Khorne
* Instrument

TROOPS
Pink Horrors (10)
* Icon
* Changeling
Plaguebearers (6)
* Icon
Plaguebearers (6)
Plaguebearers (6)

HEAVY SUPPORT
Daemon Prince
* Iron Hide
* Mark of Nurgle
** Cloud of Flies
** Noxious Touch
* Breath of Chaos

TOTAL: 1498

Tactics would be relatively straight forward. Fatey would pal around with the Crushers & the sole Prince, the Plaguebearers would work on surviving (possibly hunt high toughness targets), and the Horrors & Heralds would spend their time shooting everything that moved while trying to keep as far away from is as their range allows. It doesn't have the killing power of my other list, but it is 57 hard-to-kill wounds.

Another thing I'm trying to figure out is how to split up the Army for Daemonic Assault. I've heard that many put their survivors/shooters in the chosen list, while the glass cannons are left to reserves, but here it's a little different. Would I want Fatey & The crushers in the first group for maximum carnage, or the second in order to bring them down on an icon?


~Muninn

[Brother Muninn]

I'm questioning the third unit of Plaguebearers. For the price of 7 PBs I could afford a suicide squad of Flamers.

I've never run PBs, so I don't know how worthwhile it would be to have another squad of them, while I know for a fact that Flamers can be used to devastating effect.

[veteransergeant]

Yeah, I'm inclined to agree with BM, so I'm curious what your thought process is. I run pure nurgle lists, and I've never seen PBs do anything but die, albeit very slowly, against anything but the worst troop choices.

[oCoYoRoAoKo]

Currently testing a Daemon list for the next 40k Throne of Skulls so ill add my input;

HQ
Fateweaver
Herald of Tzeentch
* Chariot
* We are Legion
* Master of Sorcery
* Bolt of Tzeentch
Herald of Tzeentch
* Chariot
* We are Legion
* Master of Sorcery
* Bolt of Tzeentch

ELITES
Bloodcrushers (3)
* Fury of Khorne
* Instrument
Bloodcrushers (3)
* Fury of Khorne
* Instrument

TROOPS
Pink Horrors (10)
* Icon
* Changeling
Plaguebearers (6)
* Icon
Plaguebearers (6)
Plaguebearers (6)

HEAVY SUPPORT
Daemon Prince
* Iron Hide
* Mark of Nurgle
** Cloud of Flies
** Noxious Touch
* Breath of Chaos

TOTAL: 1498

My advice to you;

1. Drop the icon on the plague bearers and reduce them to units of 5 each - Icons are a bone of contention in the daemon book. They are teleport homers but consider how you are to use them. They have to be on the field from the begining of the turn, so no uising them for wave 1 drops. Ive found that they arent necessary most of the time and the only place i use them is in my bloodcrushers for full wound allocation. On the topic of Plaguebearers, anything that wants to can take down 5 just as easily as 6. I bring 3 units of 5 and they do just fine as objective keepers.

2. Breath of Chaos on the Daemon Prince. I used to run the same prince build for a while but overall i found the breath a waste of points as it requires you to get very close on the scatter or else walk forward and fire. This reduces the chances of actually getting in combat and thats where nurgle princes shine. Its far better on units of 3 Flamers.

3. Point of personal preference but i find that Horrors work better in smaller units as bolt delivery systems (also i dont find a need for the icon, see above).

4. Another point of personal preference. I usually only add on we are legion to my heralds after ive bought everything else. Generally though, it is a good choice.

Now, if you make the changes ive suggested you will have somewhere in the region of 125-130 points to spend. It all depends on how competative you want to go. A Traditional Fate-Crusher list will spend those points on 2 more Bloodcrushers and 2 icons for them for full wound allocation. If you drop the We are Legions from your heralds, you can afford a second nurgle Daemon Prince. Alternatively, if you find your anti-tank is lacking, turn the prince into a Tzeentch one with another bolt and use the remaining points for a second prince and more horrors (including the ones you have, split into as many 5 man bolt units as desired).

Personally i would look to investing in fiends. Dropping the We are legion will allow you to bring a unit.

As for your wave split, i find a 'all or nothing' approach preferable and have one very strong wave instead of two lackluster ones. In my 1500 point army (KOS, 2 Tzeentch Heralds, 2 units bloodcrushers, 1 unit fiends, 3 units plaguebearers and 2 Tzeentch DPs) my first wave is the Keeper, Fiends, Bloodcrushers and the Princes. This deployment allows some tank-popping turn 1 and gives my opponent the prospect of 6 hard, ultra-killy units to try and get rid of. Usually it requires some serious concentration of fire to get rid of any one of those units so the prospect of having to deal with 6 in one turn is something beyond most lists (except DE venomspam which is the only list ive been unable to beat so far).

[Gop]

Sound advice there. Even though PB's are cool, they aren't terribly competitive in 5th ed. I only take 1 x 5 man unit which sits on the home objective and goes to ground. They are mighty hard to get rid of in this situation.