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Hey just a Quick question for you guys: What is the best Chaos Daemon Troop in the 6th edition codex?? I know that plaguebearers are better for holding objectives but to generalise it, what is the best basic troop in the Chaos Daemons codex??

It's a toss-up between Daemonettes and Horrors.

Daemonettes can really pile on the hurt with WS5 and all those rending attacks; to boot they're cheap, hordy and also decently fast with fleet and the +3'' to run. Setbacks are that they're melee only and will die from a stiff breeze if you don't run interference with a bigger threat.

Horrors are good because they've got dakka up the ass. A full squad of horrors can shell out 4d6 Strength 5 AP4 shots at 24'' with flickering fire. That is pretty dang good, and against T3 races the warpfire's additional wounds will wreck havoc. The only problems are that you're at the mercy of randomness once again, your opponents can deny the witch and shut your shooting down completely, and horrors are slow.

Pink Horros can fire? I've read through my codex aboout 5 times but I can't find anything about them being able to cast any spells or shoot from a distance, can you clarify that please it's getting really confusing now xD

Read their special rules, they are quite clear on how they can shoot.

As for best, you will probably want 1 of each horrors and nettes, with more nettes if you need to take down dangerous MCs

Eowyn Cloud wrote:
Pink Horros can fire? I've read through my codex aboout 5 times but I can't find anything about them being able to cast any spells or shoot from a distance, can you clarify that please it's getting really confusing now xD

Pink Horrors are mastery-level 1 psykers who must generate their psychic power from the "Change" psychic discipline (page 68 of your codex).

You can roll on the chart and get Tzeentch's Firestorm, Bolt of Change, or Infernal Gateway; or alternatively you can just pick the primaris power which is Flickering Fire of Tzeentch.

Flickering Fire is the shooting attack I mentioned above.

 BlaxicanX wrote:

Eowyn Cloud wrote:
Pink Horros can fire? I've read through my codex aboout 5 times but I can't find anything about them being able to cast any spells or shoot from a distance, can you clarify that please it's getting really confusing now xD

Pink Horrors are mastery-level 1 psykers who must generate their psychic power from the "Change" psychic discipline (page 68 of your codex).

You can roll on the chart and get Tzeentch's Firestorm, Bolt of Change, or Infernal Gateway; or alternatively you can just pick the primaris power which is Flickering Fire of Tzeentch.

Flickering Fire is the shooting attack I mentioned above.

Can't get gateway, if you roll something with more warpcharge than ML you must reroll.

Read the bestiary bit. They get psychic powers,the number of powers depends on the number of horrors. Basically you take the primaries 2D6 heavy bolted shots (although it is assault weapon type obviously).

The best way to field them is multiple units of 11 (who get to fire 3D6 shots until they loose a man. Then they fire 2D6 right down to the last man. Becaude they are Tzeentch they test against LD 10 to cast.

They also reroll saves of a 1 which means you can go to ground behind an aegis for a 2+ rerollable cover save.

The best troop depends on your list. If you run FMC spam and only need troops to chill out at the back and hold objectives then go with horrors. If you plan to swarm rush your opponent then probably daemonettes.

Plague bearers are ok but not good enough in assault and too slow and thier survivability is less than the horrors when behind an aegis or vs ignore cover shots (but better in most other situations)

xera32 wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:

Eowyn Cloud wrote:
Pink Horros can fire? I've read through my codex aboout 5 times but I can't find anything about them being able to cast any spells or shoot from a distance, can you clarify that please it's getting really confusing now xD

Pink Horrors are mastery-level 1 psykers who must generate their psychic power from the "Change" psychic discipline (page 68 of your codex).

You can roll on the chart and get Tzeentch's Firestorm, Bolt of Change, or Infernal Gateway; or alternatively you can just pick the primaris power which is Flickering Fire of Tzeentch.

Flickering Fire is the shooting attack I mentioned above.

Can't get gateway, if you roll something with more warpcharge than ML you must reroll.

Good catch. I forgot about that.

Huh. That means they have a 50% to get a Strength D6+4, AP2 attack. It's only a single attack, but... with warpflame I can see some uses for that.

I believe it's the brotherhood of psykers USR but not positive. I would bring Horrors to DS in and pop nettes out of my portalglyph.

Basically just don't take bloodletters. Other three are good situationally.

Also depends on army. As allies, nettes tend not to have enough other targets to saturate. Without the glyph I would stick to big plague blobs to hold the back field and free up the rest to get movin.

I've only played two games so far with daemons, but Plaguebearers and Horrors did very well for me.

Horrors provided a ranged threat and reasonable firepower, Plaguebearers took out a Land Raider one game and a Defiler in the other with their Touch of Rust ability.

Bloodletters and Daemonettes didn't do much, and haven't tried Nurglings yet, but early days

Forgot Plaguebearers are troops. : o

Yah, PB's are good. I wouldn't use them in an offensive role because of how slow they are, but they're fantastic for guarding an object. Shrouded+go to ground makes them very hard to dislodge.

Nobody seems to like bloodletters alot. Is there a specific reason why they would be inferiour to the other basic troops? They don't seem that bad to me if you run them in a horde squad of 20 , they can have lots of attacks with the furious charge special rule due to their mark of Khorne if you charge them with the banner of blood they can charge 6+D6'' That's a pretty damn far charge. And they're more tanky than the daemonettes so that they can take more blows before they reach the enemy. Are they really that bad?

Eowyn Cloud wrote:
Nobody seems to like bloodletters alot. Is there a specific reason why they would be inferiour to the other basic troops? They don't seem that bad to me if you run them in a horde squad of 20 , they can have lots of attacks with the furious charge special rule due to their mark of Khorne if you charge them with the banner of blood they can charge 6+D6'' That's a pretty damn far charge. And they're more tanky than the daemonettes so that they can take more blows before they reach the enemy. Are they really that bad?

Daemonettes run faster and have fleet out of the bat. Most people play against shooty armies so the ability to make it to combat is more highly prised than the ability to fight melee

Daemonettes, big time. Those nasty little ladies are dirt cheap, crazy fast, and can kill literally anything up to about AV12. Give them a herald casting invisibility, or Forewarning + Grimoire, and go to town. Basic troops should not be so killy as these things, but they are, so profit!

We can exclude bloodletter from the debate. Because they suck.
That leaves nettes, horrors, plaguebearers. Each has a different role.

Pink horrors do best mid field where they can objective camp but still fire their shooting attack.

PB's sit on backfield objectives like potatoes.

Daemonettes charge up the field. The problem is they are squishy and you still need units to hold objectives which they are not so good at.

That leaves Pb and Horrors for objective holding. PB's and Horrors are around the same durability considering horrors if they get a 2+ cover by going to ground get the 2++ rerollable tzeentch nonsense. They can also shoot while the PB's can only damage in assault.

Personally I think for holding objectives horrors are the best by far. For doing damage daemonettes are strongest. My concern is that especially in tournament/maximized lists there are things that do what the daemonettes do but much better per points value often. Such as FMC.

 BlaxicanX wrote:

xera32 wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:

Eowyn Cloud wrote:
Pink Horros can fire? I've read through my codex aboout 5 times but I can't find anything about them being able to cast any spells or shoot from a distance, can you clarify that please it's getting really confusing now xD

Pink Horrors are mastery-level 1 psykers who must generate their psychic power from the "Change" psychic discipline (page 68 of your codex).

You can roll on the chart and get Tzeentch's Firestorm, Bolt of Change, or Infernal Gateway; or alternatively you can just pick the primaris power which is Flickering Fire of Tzeentch.

Flickering Fire is the shooting attack I mentioned above.

Can't get gateway, if you roll something with more warpcharge than ML you must reroll.

Good catch. I forgot about that.

Huh. That means they have a 50% to get a Strength D6+4, AP2 attack. It's only a single attack, but... with warpflame I can see some uses for that.

Isnt that attack beam?

Also, I used to run plague bearers, and they were fantastic objective campers, however tau and eldar ignore cover made that hard. With the increase of space marines, and, at least around where I play, every space marine player running 2 thunderfire cannons they just get destroyed. A unit deep striking in will get wrecked by one thunderfire cannon with no cover saves.

I vote Pink horrors as the best objective campers now due to their reroll of 1's, they get to shoot and if you go to ground they get a 3+ cover reroll 1's. Also if you play a portal glyph, and you should if you are playing competative, they are the go to candidate for that as even 1 horror gets 2d6 str5 ap4 shots.

The one thing I love about horrors is that 1 is just as effective as a 10 man squad. They don't lose effectiveness until they are destroyed. As said before, their reroll of 1s for saves makes them arguably harder to kill than plaguebearers.
I say it's between daemonettes and horrors, but I think horrors edge them out.

Daemonettes running up behind a unit of hounds is pretty awesome. Both hit hard, support each other and each is a charge deterrent for the other.

Plaguebearers are god mode objective holders, I hate running up against them. After that I'd say horrors, I'd rather have the options of shooting at stuff.

I find that 2 to 1 nettes to horrors, is the best way to do it. The horror's shooting output is low, but make decent backfield scorers, or a decent deepstrike and shoot on xenos. Nettes are by far the best upfield objective campers, as being out of sight is infinitely better than even a 2+ cover, and being fleet +run makes getting into position much faster.

Not to mention one of the biggest problems daemons face is enemy MCs that can smash our orinces, and nettes will slaughter any MC they can catch.

Nobody seems to even consider Nurglings. I know little of them, but are they bad or did people just not think about them? They don't seem very good to me, but I know little of what's competetive for daemons.

Fidget wrote:
Nobody seems to even consider Nurglings. I know little of them, but are they bad or did people just not think about them? They don't seem very good to me, but I know little of what's competetive for daemons.

Easily instagibbed overpriced swarms with minimal killing ability? What's not to love!

 Kain wrote:

Fidget wrote:
Nobody seems to even consider Nurglings. I know little of them, but are they bad or did people just not think about them? They don't seem very good to me, but I know little of what's competetive for daemons.

Easily instagibbed overpriced swarms with minimal killing ability? What's not to love!

Can swarms get instakilled? That kinda seems illogical to me. I can see how they would be bad though. 6" movement, 3S and 3T? Yeah, seems pretty bad.

Fidget wrote:

 Kain wrote:

Fidget wrote:
Nobody seems to even consider Nurglings. I know little of them, but are they bad or did people just not think about them? They don't seem very good to me, but I know little of what's competetive for daemons.

Easily instagibbed overpriced swarms with minimal killing ability? What's not to love!

Can swarms get instakilled? That kinda seems illogical to me. I can see how they would be bad though. 6" movement, 3S and 3T? Yeah, seems pretty bad.

Not only are they vulnerable to instant death, they take double wounds from blasts and templates.

In a game where some of the most spammed units use blasts and templates that ignore cover saves.

Yeaaaaahhhh.

 Kain wrote:

Fidget wrote:

 Kain wrote:

Fidget wrote:
Nobody seems to even consider Nurglings. I know little of them, but are they bad or did people just not think about them? They don't seem very good to me, but I know little of what's competetive for daemons.

Easily instagibbed overpriced swarms with minimal killing ability? What's not to love!

Can swarms get instakilled? That kinda seems illogical to me. I can see how they would be bad though. 6" movement, 3S and 3T? Yeah, seems pretty bad.

Not only are they vulnerable to instant death, they take double wounds from blasts and templates.

In a game where some of the most spammed units use blasts and templates that ignore cover saves.

Yeaaaaahhhh.

Well nevermind those then. The only good thing is that you get those lil extra guys with them, good for decorating...

 BlaxicanX wrote:
It's a toss-up between Daemonettes and Horrors.

Daemonettes can really pile on the hurt with WS5 and all those rending attacks; to boot they're cheap, hordy and also decently fast with fleet and the +3'' to run. Setbacks are that they're melee only and will die from a stiff breeze if you don't run interference with a bigger threat.

Horrors are good because they've got dakka up the ass. A full squad of horrors can shell out 4d6 Strength 5 AP4 shots at 24'' with flickering fire. That is pretty dang good, and against T3 races the warpfire's additional wounds will wreck havoc. The only problems are that you're at the mercy of randomness once again, your opponents can deny the witch and shut your shooting down completely, and horrors are slow.

I'd like to add that if you babysit pink horrors with a herald it becomes S6 ap4. The fnp hand outs can be a problem on occasion but if you go that way you will want to wipe out a unit before they receive a benefit from your spells. Oh, and on another note. Pink Horrors have the plus that they re-roll 1s on their saves. This means that naturally they have a 5++ with a 1+ reroll, this can easily become a 4+ by way of divination, 3+ by way of the warp, rarely a 2+ by way of the warpstorm or book, and finally, hiding behind cover of 4+ or 3+ they become extremely durable and can still go to ground. Finally, you only need one pink horror to have LoS.

 StarTrotter wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:
It's a toss-up between Daemonettes and Horrors.

Daemonettes can really pile on the hurt with WS5 and all those rending attacks; to boot they're cheap, hordy and also decently fast with fleet and the +3'' to run. Setbacks are that they're melee only and will die from a stiff breeze if you don't run interference with a bigger threat.

Horrors are good because they've got dakka up the ass. A full squad of horrors can shell out 4d6 Strength 5 AP4 shots at 24'' with flickering fire. That is pretty dang good, and against T3 races the warpfire's additional wounds will wreck havoc. The only problems are that you're at the mercy of randomness once again, your opponents can deny the witch and shut your shooting down completely, and horrors are slow.

I'd like to add that if you babysit pink horrors with a herald it becomes S6 ap4. The fnp hand outs can be a problem on occasion but if you go that way you will want to wipe out a unit before they receive a benefit from your spells. Oh, and on another note. Pink Horrors have the plus that they re-roll 1s on their saves. This means that naturally they have a 5++ with a 1+ reroll, this can easily become a 4+ by way of divination, 3+ by way of the warp, rarely a 2+ by way of the warpstorm or book, and finally, hiding behind cover of 4+ or 3+ they become extremely durable and can still go to ground. Finally, you only need one pink horror to have LoS.

Also, protip, using flickering fire against nurgle bikers ends badly.

I think by the end of the game I was facing 2+ fnp bikers marines. I was also semi-drunk while playing so that may have explained why I was constantly trying the same thing and expecting something different to happen.

Eowyn Cloud wrote:
Nobody seems to like bloodletters alot. Is there a specific reason why they would be inferiour to the other basic troops? They don't seem that bad to me if you run them in a horde squad of 20 , they can have lots of attacks with the furious charge special rule due to their mark of Khorne if you charge them with the banner of blood they can charge 6+D6'' That's a pretty damn far charge. And they're more tanky than the daemonettes so that they can take more blows before they reach the enemy. Are they really that bad?

Simply put, bloodletters just aren't really worth it. They aren't as fast as daemonettes, only have a toughness of 3, and they only have 1A per model. Their swords went from ap2 to ap3 meaning that they lost that, they are now only I4. The most intriguing things about them are that they have a WS and BS of 5. Te problem is that for the WS, daemonettes have the same WS and the BS means very little as they don't come with guns nor do they have any psyker powers so you will rarely see it used. Along with that, whilst it seems cool to have bloodletters manning AA guns meaning to hits on 2s, this means that you have t3 models squatting behind cover with swords doing absolutely nothing. Daemonettes in comparison are also T3, however, they are not only faster moving across the battlefield, but they also have rending, 2 attacks per model, and a higher initiative meaning they can kill before being killed. Their lower BS means very little sense the will rarely be shooting either. Plague Horrors are good but slow and really can only squat on an objective. Pink Horrors have their risks and drawbacks and are INCREDIBLY random and unreliable, but, they can be surprisingly durable (even sometimes more than Plaguebearers) and are one of the few ways we can fire shots in our codex at a decent range might I add.

Nurglings.... just don't look at them. They can't score, they can be instadeated by S6 weapons up, don't even have fnp, and to finish it in a kick to the head, all template and blast weapons wound them multiple times. Overall, they are like ripper swarms. Pretend like they don't exist.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kain wrote:

 StarTrotter wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:
It's a toss-up between Daemonettes and Horrors.

Daemonettes can really pile on the hurt with WS5 and all those rending attacks; to boot they're cheap, hordy and also decently fast with fleet and the +3'' to run. Setbacks are that they're melee only and will die from a stiff breeze if you don't run interference with a bigger threat.

Horrors are good because they've got dakka up the ass. A full squad of horrors can shell out 4d6 Strength 5 AP4 shots at 24'' with flickering fire. That is pretty dang good, and against T3 races the warpfire's additional wounds will wreck havoc. The only problems are that you're at the mercy of randomness once again, your opponents can deny the witch and shut your shooting down completely, and horrors are slow.

I'd like to add that if you babysit pink horrors with a herald it becomes S6 ap4. The fnp hand outs can be a problem on occasion but if you go that way you will want to wipe out a unit before they receive a benefit from your spells. Oh, and on another note. Pink Horrors have the plus that they re-roll 1s on their saves. This means that naturally they have a 5++ with a 1+ reroll, this can easily become a 4+ by way of divination, 3+ by way of the warp, rarely a 2+ by way of the warpstorm or book, and finally, hiding behind cover of 4+ or 3+ they become extremely durable and can still go to ground. Finally, you only need one pink horror to have LoS.

Also, protip, using flickering fire against nurgle bikers ends badly.

I think by the end of the game I was facing 2+ fnp bikers marines. I was also semi-drunk while playing so that may have explained why I was constantly trying the same thing and expecting something different to happen.

Ha ha. Reminds me of when I just started up a daemon army. All I had was 18 pink horrors, a herald of tzeentch, a skull cannon of khorne,10 bloodletters, and one herald of khorne. He was playing Nurgle and Slaanesh (we tried to split it up. I partly regret it as I've grown to increasingly like slaanesh now being my second favorite god after Tzeentch). His hordes of daemonettes and seekers of slaanesh eventually killed off my skull cannon and I then wiped them all out. One problem, I had to fight a gigantic, massive, huge as feth horde of plague marines with a herald leading them all the while buffing them with psyker powers and providing FNP. I had to sit their firing volley after volley of FNP providing psyker spells at him because I had no more guns and the whittled down bloodletters (had lost a few after finishing off the seekers and daemonettes. Now I only had 2 left) wouldn't be enough to kill them. They had I think a 3+ fnp by then... Anyways they climbed up the building but failed a charge. And then I promptly assaulted him with bloodletters and pink horrors mainly killing him by glorious wait of numbers. And, to add insult to injury, finishing the last plague marine with blue horrors mwahahahaha.... Still though, if you want to aim at something with a FNP with Pink horrors. Shoot shoot shoot! Focus fire them off the battlefield. Don't shoot them with pink horrors and then use your other unit to shoot a different unit. You want to annihilate that single squad or at least leave them so crippled it doesn't matter. Actually, that's good advise for tzeentch in general.

I think it's funny how when the codex first came out everybody thought plaguebearers were the best troops hands down. Now the meta has shifted to where everybody sees that horrors and daemonettes are clearly better.

herpguy wrote:
I think it's funny how when the codex first came out everybody thought plaguebearers were the best troops hands down. Now the meta has shifted to where everybody sees that horrors and daemonettes are clearly better.

Bearers are pretty much defense only due to how slowly they move. And the Daemons just aren't an army that is terribly suited for defensive play. They're not bad so much as Horrors and Daemonettes just fit the army much better. Though being as slow as they are with only melee weapons does hurt quite a bit.