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Hey everyone! First post cause I don't know what else to do lol

My friend and I both started playing together several years back and we both really only play against each other. We each have 2 completed(kinda) armies and one in progress. I play Admech, Tyranid and am currently working on harlequins. He plays Ultramarines, Death Guard, and Custodes.

The problem I'm running into is that I am just flat garbage at this game apparently lol. I feel like its been WELL over a year since I've even come close to winning a game! Every match feels like I'm swinging a plastic bat against a steel wall. Here's my main issues:

VS. Ultramarines: These are probably the ones I have the best chances with (most of the time). He uses Primaris exclusively with aggressors, terminators, etc... When I shoot at him, I feel like It takes like 2 rounds to clear a troop off of an objective. and thats WITH me pouring multiple units into him. Yet when he shoots at my objective holders, its like 3 dudes are enough to completely wipe my unit. Not to mention, the pure amount of strategem buffs that they have on top of literally NEVER missing due to rerolls for days makes it so whatever they decide to blast at, its gone.

VS. Death Guard: Simple. I can't kill them. The other day, I had like 10ish haywire cannons from harlies shooting into ONE of the deathguard tank things (the ones with morters) and even with an abnormally huge amount of shots , i think I did like 4 wounds to it? and that was 2 units!. Then he hits one of those units with just 2 flail guys and they are GONE. I know I'm squishy as harlies. But I have this issue with EVERY army I have. I can dedicate my whole army to killing one unit and still not do it, and he has a dude or two from one unit completely wipe mine (almost regardless of my army)

VS. Custodes: He kits them all with shields so they all have 3+ invul. I've sent 6 castelan robots in shooty mode at one unit of 3 custodes and ALMOST killed 1. Then he wipes all 6 robots on the next turn.


I used this metaphor when talking the other day about this: "on my turn, its like I'm punching a brick wall. I crack some bricks, a crumble a bit of it, I do a good job starting the process of breaking it down. On his turn, The wall pulls out a gun and shoots me in the arms. on my turn I'm struggling kicking the wall now doing a bit more even with being crippled. On his turn he shoots me in the legs."

TL;DR Normally I'm a good loser and don't get this salty, but not winning a SINGLE game in over a year can make a person a LITTLE bitter.... What can I do differently?

In my experience the most common issue people face with durability skew is twofold:

first, overconfidence. People don't account for stratagems, or don't think about the special rules the units have, or just plain don't know what the expected damage SHOULD BE that they're up against, and during the phase they position stuff to deal damage (movement) they don't position enough stuff to kill what they need to kill, and things end up alive with a few wounds left instead of dead.

Second, priority. People tend to prioritize trying to kill what's scary to them, instead of what they need to kill.

Third, walking right into traps. If my opponent has a stratagem that allows 1 vehicle unit to halve all damage coming into a vehicle, and another one that subracts 1 from all damage going into a vehicle, what I need to do on my turn is NOT POSITION EVERYTHING TO TRY AND HURT EXACTLY ONE VEHICLE. Instead, i should either not try to hurt a vehicle at all, focus some other target, or try to bait out the stratagems by putting down a suicide piece or a threatening melta unit or something against 1 vehicle and making like I"m going to start attacking them, then switch targets once he's used the strats, or I should make him burn the strats but instead just charge/otherwise impede the vehicle. I should not play exactly into his hands and do exaclty what he wants me to do.

can you provide me an example of a list you'd play against this opponent, and a list he'd bring against you?

IDK his exact list from the last game, but it was something like this:
3x Plagueburst Crawlers
1x 3Blight Hauler
1x 8 Terminators ((the Deathguard flavor) with 2 flails)
1x 5 plague marines
1x rhino (just to carry some dudes)
1x Chaos knight (only had melee weapons, one was a fist i think)
Some cultists (11 i think he had?)
a death guard psyker guy (idk the name)
a demon prince
and some other character that was giving grenade buffs?


I had Harlequins:
5x 5 Troupes with fusions and kiss
2x 5 bikes with haywire and glaive
5x transports for clowns
1x death jester
1x solitaire
2x troupe master
1x shadow seer.

If he took a knight , and was still using some of the DG special rules, then there is a chance he was cheating, because armies lose some of their rules if they soup in this edition.

what I learned form almost 3 years of not winning a single game is this though. First skill is important, as is army composition and playing the scenarios etc but sometimes the difference between two armies are so big, that it doesn't really matter how good you are. there is also stuff like skews in w40k.

harlequins vs marines is a unfavourable match up, if both armies are properly build, and the terrain isn't too wierd. And there isn't much the sm player can do about it, without going anti harlequin heavy with the stuff they buy.

Also, and this is more a thing I know from sport, people have their limits of how good they can be. And it is good to know how good you are. Maybe you are just a bad player. I am a bad one for example, and I never expect my army to do stuff some australian GT winners lists do.

Well, the obvious targets you want to take out in that list are the blighthaulers that you can attack with melta pretty efficiently and the knight that you can attack with haywire and doesn't have the inbuilt DG defense against mortal wounds.In your list I'd question the second TM and the decision to go all Kisses on the clowns, seems like an overly expensive loadout to me idk

I'm going to assume this wasn't the exact list, because I get well over 2250 points for it (and it's not a battlion or patrol, I'm guessing there were more cultists and then..maybe just 2 PBCs or something) but, assuming this kind of a matchup, here's how I'd approach things:

1) I can deal about 18-19 wounds to that knight in one turn (assuming Great Harlequin is going to be nearby giving reroll 1s) and he can't do anything about it with my haywire. Unfortunately melta's not a great way to deal with a knight, since he can just pop rotate and have a 75% chance of not taking a wound from a hit, but you do really only need 2 hits to come through to finish him off, so you could commit two weavers to him even assuming rotate and probably reliably take him out, or you could just pump the haywire into him and try to finish him up the next turn.

2) you definitely want to take out all three blighthaulers ASAP with your meltas. They're the only t7 target presented other than the rhino (and you do not care about the rhino) so they're the best thing to attack with melta, and they are absolute MONSTERS after the multimelta change.

After that point, I'd probably start working on PBCs with haywire, and play the objective grabbing game. Get the troupes out on the field shooting and charging stuff.

Certainly worth double checking his points if it seems doubtful. Also read up on the rules for mixing armies, as people have said it can affect an armies special rules.

Play for the win, not the kill. score points, and deny them from your opponent. Read through your stratagems and work out some nasty combos, and as others have said, don't play how your opponent wants you to!

I'm like 99% he's not cheating or anything. If anything, he cheats FOR me cause he's scared if I keep up the losing streak, I'll stop playing lol (Which is disheartening in its own right!)

But yeah, the Blight haulers wrecked a bunch and I get now I should have focused them.

Would I be right in thinking that in the case of this particular match up, my troupes shouldn't be really worried with the plaguemarines or other troop choices because they can just out run them? Should I just focus less on killing and more on running away?

My initial reaction was actually the armies involved. I know we talk it up a lot on here about how certain factions are "OMG so OP" etc etc whatever, and it's often hyperbole, but there is an element of truth in there. Space Marines are still very strong in their new Codex, Death Guard are built for toughness and it sounds like he's taking full advantage. Custodes and Harlequins are in a similar space where they're tricky to use properly, but very powerful if you do it right. Meanwhile... AdMech and Nids aren't necessarily bad? But they're not as good.

My suggestion would be to try playing a couple of games where you take each other's armies - literally, use each other's choices, pick a list that you've used in previous games complete with the same Warlord traits, relics etc - and see what happens. You'll have to help guide each other through what stratagems are there and maybe remind each other when to use them, but it sounds like you're friendly enough that this won't be a problem.

Army swap is super informative. When people were just plain refusing to do this in 7th, I knew my army was plain trash lol.

We've actually talked about doing an army swap before! We just never get around to doing it because each time we play we (usually me lol) have something new we wanna try out (either a new model, a new arrangement, or new strategy)

If the Knight is in a detachment with DG, those DG lose their DG powers.

If the knight is in a separate deatchment, legal, but he's gotta pay CP. If all your stuff fits in a single core detachment, you should have him beat on the CP front; if he's using a Knight, all your stuff fits in one core detachment, and he has equal CP, the only way that is possible is if he gives up his DG specific powers. I won't say your friend is cheating- it's easy to make mistakes. But double check the list to be sure.

When you use your Harlies, are you using the WD rules for pivotal roles? I think I recall there were some other goodies in that article that beefed up Harlies a bit- I don't have any of them, so I'm less than certain.

Part of it I think is that the armies you have can be difficult to play well, where as the armies he is using are generally much easier to come to grips with. Both Tyranids and Harlequins are good armies in the hands of a skilled player, but are squishy with a lot of points of failure when you are still developing as a player.

Admech is probably the most forgiving of the three armies you listed while you are still trying to get better. I also think army swap is a good idea, as the armies he is using are better starter armies across the board.

His knight was in a separate detachment. He started with only 4 CP because of pre-game stratagems and detachments.

I was using the pivotal role stuff. I think I gave my solitaire the -1 to hit one and paid CP so he could keep blitz (solitaire actually did pretty well in this fight)

LeBattery wrote:
I'm like 99% he's not cheating or anything. If anything, he cheats FOR me cause he's scared if I keep up the losing streak, I'll stop playing lol (Which is disheartening in its own right!)

But yeah, the Blight haulers wrecked a bunch and I get now I should have focused them.

Would I be right in thinking that in the case of this particular match up, my troupes shouldn't be really worried with the plaguemarines or other troop choices because they can just out run them? Should I just focus less on killing and more on running away?

Cheating and not knowing his rules are similar but different things. They’re saying cheating when just not knowing the rules is more likely.

I had the same issue back when I played Warmachine. I loved the lore and models for Cygnar and bought a large army, had it painted well by my ability, and still couldn't win with them. I forced myself to play them over and over trying new warcasters and different strategies but I just couldn't make them work. I also had Cryx and Legion of Everblight and I clicked with and had no issues. If you were playing a single army I would say it may be the playstyle of the army doesn't mesh with your own style. I have not played with or against Admech and I am not very familiar with Harliquinns. I do know about Tyranids and they have several different styles of play. Are you doing hordes, big bugs, or a mix?

Super Ready beat me to it.

#1 - Try an army swap. If he's able to win with your army, then it's because he's doing something with moving his guys that lets them win. Each army he has is high durability, high lethality, and has a lot of options. All three are noted as just naturally doing the things that win games of 9th edition. Like you said, he walks up to objectives and stands on them, taking your entire army sometimes to knock a single unit off just 1 objective. Their armies are kind of designed to do that. But there are ways around it.

#2 - Are you playing with one hand tied behind your back? A lot of Tyranid and Ad Mech units are.... uh... awful. They do a job that isn't a good job to do, and they do it poorly. Especially Nids. However, they do have some gems, and you need to focus on those. Ad Mech probably have the strongest shooting in the whole game, but only if you build for it! You can get full rerolls too as Mars, Kastellan Robots unleash the most insane shooting I've ever seen, and the treaded troops with Grav Cannons ain't far behind them. If you're not playing with these things because they're "cheesy" or the like, well, you're letting yourself get trounced. The entire Marine and Custode army is built like how stupidly OP these Admech units are, so you literally can't win by playing fair. Alternatively, if like me your love of things Tyranid-y overwhelms your sensibilities, find some other way of messing him up. I play an NPC army; Genestealer Cult. They are the squishiest of the squishiest. But I win by doing what NPC's do best; getting in the way. My army dies almost 100% every game, but I end the game with 85-95VP while my opponent ends with 35-55VP, so I win. Why? Because I can literally road-block my opponent the whole way. Find stuff that lets you control where your opponent can or can't move. Don't go for the kill. It's not fun like how you told 40k would be fun, but it is a way to win.

#3 - Talk to your friend. Tell him you don't know what you're doing wrong and that it is disheartening. Ask him to help you win a game against him so that you can see what stuff he's worried about, and maybe better lines of play you don't realize are there. Team-work!

Good luck!

Some brief things I'm picking up about your post:
- Best to double-check the points and his army composition, as like others have said, some combinations result in losing army-wide traits.

- 40k isn't solely about having the firepower to kill everything he has, sometimes there is a greater degree of thought/mindgames to be had. For example with your Harlequins vs DG; his PGBs hit on 4+. Your transports have a default -1 to hit, same as your bikes if you use LFR on them. His PGBs are hitting on 5+ with a random shot weapon. You have a 4++ Invulnerable save. For the most part you could actually ignore them and focus your bikes on other things.

- Vs Custodes will be different as the shield no longer gives s 3++ Invuln. Either way if you have 6 Dakkabots going against them my immediate resort would be to use Wrath of Mars. Even if you split-fire and only put 3 of them, you'd get approx. 31 hits (according to MathHammer). On average from those 31 hits you could expect to see 5 Mortal Wounds, enough to possibly kill 2 Custodes before he rolls a single save.


I totally understand how crushing it can be to lose consistently. Don't get disheartened. I would also recommend checking out Tabletop Tactics' videos, as they cover a wide variety of tactical lists and various videos on the pros and cons of each army.

Admech was my first army and its the one I enjoy playing most (and its the one I would LOVE to see succeed), but against all his super beefy guys (in any of his armies) i feel like the featherweight who snuck into a heavyweight match.

My admech lists are primarily made of robots and dunecrawlers (with caul in there for rerolls) and they USUALLY work great! its just the current game is focused around getting objectives and I cant get the squishy rangers/vanguard to live long enough to hold anything. I've never tried the kataphron guys, but I have looked at them a lot and they look like they would help since all of his armies have saves of 3+ or better...

Would it be smart to swap ranger/vanguard completely out for the kataphron guys? or would they be to easy a target with their low model counts? I also had the idea of getting some more electropriests + a transport (I'll try anything at this point lol)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
ALSO! just a strategy question, Are admech dakkabots better in one blob? or in separate smaller blobs?

I started playing Dark Angels at the start of 8th. I didnt won a single game until a year and a half I started playing.

That teached me patience and to never get angry or salty about losing, probably thats why most people I know say I'm the best "sports" player they have played agaisnt.

Don't become discouraged! As others have said, marines and custodes are very good now, but harlequines and admech are also very good. Buuut they are much harder armies to play!

I recommend you to read "star competing!" articles in goonhammer, watching youtube tactica videos, etc... they'll teach you things you'll have missed, or how to "Play the mission", etc...

I started playing again with my taus (my biggest and first army) after PA. I loved my farsight bombs. But right now in 8th Tau just dont work. Lucky I have an adeptus custodes army but it sucks when your favourite army just stops working. Lucky for you, it is not your case! Tyranids are a relatively "weak" army that can still win BUT needs extremely finesse play specially in the movement phase.

In the Harlequins vs DG matchup I would focus the knight, focus the MBHs, and then shift to a strategy where my troupes would dismount and begin playing a mobile objective game. PBCs are very little threat to my stuff, particularly if they have the single-shot cannons and not the flamers, since I can just tie them up in combat forever and they can't kill basically anything. All my attention would be on trying to take out my opponent's ability to score after the knight and haulers were down.

A troupe should have no problem advancing, shooting, charging, and wiping a squad of marines, cultists, or a DG character.The DP is probably the biggest threat but I can't imagine he'd be super jazzed and winning a fight after 5 meltas to the face.

 Valkyrie wrote:
Some brief things I'm picking up about your post:
- Vs Custodes will be different as the shield no longer gives s 3++ Invuln.

minor point, but the shields 4++ still gets buffed to 3++ by the Custodes "the Emperors Children" detachment ability, so a sword and board custodes is now 1+/3++.

i also recommend trying a army swap or two. as others have said, hes picked some fairly beginner friendly armies, and you've picked some...less beginner friendly ones. it will be intresting for both of you to see if you suddenly start preforming better with his custodes agianst his death guard.


Also, if this guy is good freind (and by the sounds of it, he might well be), then why just ask him what HE thinks your doing wrong after each game? obviously, he's seeing and exploiting mistakes your making, so once the game is over, why not ask him what he thinks you were doing wrong, and what he might have done differently?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

LeBattery wrote:
Admech was my first army and its the one I enjoy playing most (and its the one I would LOVE to see succeed), but against all his super beefy guys (in any of his armies) i feel like the featherweight who snuck into a heavyweight match.

My admech lists are primarily made of robots and dunecrawlers (with caul in there for rerolls) and they USUALLY work great! its just the current game is focused around getting objectives and I cant get the squishy rangers/vanguard to live long enough to hold anything. I've never tried the kataphron guys, but I have looked at them a lot and they look like they would help since all of his armies have saves of 3+ or better...

Would it be smart to swap ranger/vanguard completely out for the kataphron guys? or would they be to easy a target with their low model counts? I also had the idea of getting some more electropriests + a transport (I'll try anything at this point lol)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
ALSO! just a strategy question, Are admech dakkabots better in one blob? or in separate smaller blobs?

Id say 100% yes to the electropriest boat. its a very common tactic, and its common becuase it works. the staff armed preists are among your best CC units, and if they can get into melee they can be very effective. If nothing else, the time he's spending shooting them is not spent shooting your other stuff.

the kataphrons are another very good unit, either type. A lot of people are starting to run the Heavy-grav cannon varient because heavy 5, str 5, -3 AP is a very good marine killer. the other type with the Heavy arc rifle and arc claw is also pretty common, espically with the Data Hoard Forge World dogma (every 5+ to hit causes additional hit with arc weapons), found in the Psychic Awakening: Engine War book.

speaking of that book, if you having got it already, do so. its got ton of good units for the admech, like the Dunerider transports, and the Raider cavalry, which a lot of Admech players are finding really, really good at screening and contesting objectives (not taking them, really, but slowing down the enemy form doing so, giving you time).

LeBattery wrote:
Admech was my first army and its the one I enjoy playing most (and its the one I would LOVE to see succeed), but against all his super beefy guys (in any of his armies) i feel like the featherweight who snuck into a heavyweight match.

My admech lists are primarily made of robots and dunecrawlers (with caul in there for rerolls) and they USUALLY work great! its just the current game is focused around getting objectives and I cant get the squishy rangers/vanguard to live long enough to hold anything. I've never tried the kataphron guys, but I have looked at them a lot and they look like they would help since all of his armies have saves of 3+ or better...

Would it be smart to swap ranger/vanguard completely out for the kataphron guys? or would they be to easy a target with their low model counts? I also had the idea of getting some more electropriests + a transport (I'll try anything at this point lol)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
ALSO! just a strategy question, Are admech dakkabots better in one blob? or in separate smaller blobs?

One big blob with Wrath of Mars is typically seen as the most effective way to do it.

 Valkyrie wrote:

- Vs Custodes will be different as the shield no longer gives s 3++ Invuln.

Yeah it does. Storm shield gives them a base save of 4++, Custodes detachment rules improve invulnerable save by 1 to a max of 3++. So a Guard with a storm shield is rocking a 1+ in the open with a 3++.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Super Ready wrote:
My initial reaction was actually the armies involved. I know we talk it up a lot on here about how certain factions are "OMG so OP" etc etc whatever, and it's often hyperbole, but there is an element of truth in there. Space Marines are still very strong in their new Codex, Death Guard are built for toughness and it sounds like he's taking full advantage. Custodes and Harlequins are in a similar space where they're tricky to use properly, but very powerful if you do it right. Meanwhile... AdMech and Nids aren't necessarily bad? But they're not as good.

Admech are one of the best armies in the game right now, comparable with Death Guard and Custodes if not Marines or Harlequins.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

LeBattery wrote:
IDK his exact list from the last game, but it was something like this:
3x Plagueburst Crawlers
1x 3Blight Hauler
1x 8 Terminators ((the Deathguard flavor) with 2 flails)
1x 5 plague marines
1x rhino (just to carry some dudes)
1x Chaos knight (only had melee weapons, one was a fist i think)
Some cultists (11 i think he had?)
a death guard psyker guy (idk the name)
a demon prince
and some other character that was giving grenade buffs?

I had Harlequins:
5x 5 Troupes with fusions and kiss
2x 5 bikes with haywire and glaive
5x transports for clowns
1x death jester
1x solitaire
2x troupe master
1x shadow seer.

Kisses are better in some circumstances, but generally speaking harlequin's caresses are the way to go IMO. S5 is a big breakpoint, since now you're wounding most infantry on 3s and even beefy infantry boys like Custodes or Death Guard on 4s, and the AP2 against those armies is a big break point.

I'd also consider potentially dropping the Solitaire and just having a Twilight Fang Troupe Master who has taken Darkness' Bite to either replace or add to choreographer of war. With that loadout you're looking at an extremely efficient melee beat stick for only 60 points and 1-2 CP. The Solitaire isn't bad but he needs Cegorach's Rose to really shine and I honestly think the Twilight Fang master is the better play most of the time, as the game goes on he'll have an eye-watering amount of high value attacks and deal two mortal wounds every time he fights (using war dancers this is four mortal wounds total).

Death Jester is also potentially skippable, at least against those factions. If possible fitting in five more Skyweavers to give you better odds of dunking the knight could be worth it. That'd be an average of over 15 mortal wounds hitting it, which is also enough to kill a Plagueburst crawler.

Also consder just ignoring the crawlers. With so many -1s to hit against a BS4 vehicle its ability to actually kill your dudes is limited.

It seems to me that he's playing FOTM armies while you're playing for fun.

Ultramarines, Custodes and Death Guard are all super strong FOTM armies that haven't really taken any hits in the change over to 9th.

Tyranids and Harlequins are not very good yet, but I hope they will get better with codices. Admech is great, but a niche army that has to be played extremely well to do well against UM or DG.

I suggest you ask him if you can run one of his armies in a game and see if you can pull out a victory. If you're hitting the targets that need to be hit, using your CP smartly, and securing objectives for all those sweet points it might just be your lists aren't competitive against what he's bringing. See if he'll let you use one of his to kind of filter out the offset army strengths. Worst he can say is no. Also, post the lists you run in the list forum and let the hivemind give you tips on improving.

*Edit*
If you're worried about him cheating, intentionally or not, ask him to bring a list with his points costs from battlescribe or the Warhammer App, and ask him to reference what he's doing in his codex and let you review it. If he says no, then he's probably trying to cheat you.

Im really surpirsed he fits all that in a 2K game.. Seems off to em but Im not a DG player so would need to run that through BS.


I would suggest really focusing on playing the mission and watching some bat reps including quins. The speed of quins really lends itslef to grabbing objectives. Dont play to kill his hard to kill stuff army. Play to win VP and shoot what you can kill with the aim to remove his objective scoring ability rather than his shooting ability (if you can do both then great!).

Also, if hes souping, maybe you can soup some CWE units.. Not trying to say the only way forward is to get more stuff, but might be a consideration. Bikes are great and all but the fact heywire vs T8 means you are basicaly fishing for 6's whcih just isint viable AT Imo. Yes you cna roll hot and deal stupid amounts of mortal wounds but thats not really a sound battle plan.

All that said, Quins are a top tier army currently due to their insane speed and bag of tricks. But expect to be tabled most games (however still win on VP)
It seems to be quite a difficult army to play and make it work but from what ive seen people can achieve very good results.

crazysaneman wrote:
It seems to me that he's playing FOTM armies while you're playing for fun.

Ultramarines, Custodes and Death Guard are all super strong FOTM armies that haven't really taken any hits in the change over to 9th.

Tyranids and Harlequins are not very good yet, but I hope they will get better with codices. Admech is great, but a niche army that has to be played extremely well to do well against UM or DG.

I suggest you ask him if you can run one of his armies in a game and see if you can pull out a victory. If you're hitting the targets that need to be hit, using your CP smartly, and securing objectives for all those sweet points it might just be your lists aren't competitive against what he's bringing. See if he'll let you use one of his to kind of filter out the offset army strengths. Worst he can say is no. Also, post the lists you run in the list forum and let the hivemind give you tips on improving.

*Edit*
If you're worried about him cheating, intentionally or not, ask him to bring a list with his points costs from battlescribe or the Warhammer App, and ask him to reference what he's doing in his codex and let you review it. If he says no, then he's probably trying to cheat you.

umm Harlies are routinely winning tournies.

So i imagine he is running something like this:



I'm no expert on DG but I think this describes the army comp more or less as you have said it? Maybe +/- a few options = 50pts ?.

You'd have to shave 250pts from this list in order to fit a knight.

A knight rampager is 415pts. There is no way hes fitting all that in at 2k pts just looking at the numbers.

Interested to know your thought OP.

Can't speak for the other armies as I neither play them nor ply against them but that DG lists has some holes in it. First off, how does he use the Crawlers? Do they have flamers or the cannons? If the latter, maybe try to tie them up in CC, they are though but not really killy. I also noticed he is sorely lacking in Obsec units, can't you just play to the objectives and tie his units in combat there? You should be able to outnumber him there and win on primary.
Edit: Also I'm not saying your friend is deliberately cheating but a unit of 8 Terminators can not have 2 flails, they are limited to one per 5 Terminators. I'm not sure why he gets this wrong but I've seen this mistake on numerous battle reports too, so I guess the rule just is not clear to some people.
Second Edit: I'm a poor reader it seems, but maybe take his DG on with your AdMech. Yes we are tanky but trust me, one of our players here plays AdMech with those horrible Robots too and those are SCARY. Yes his/my Termies are though but the sheer amount of fire you can pump into them should melt them in a turn or 2. Although please do mention, does he deepstrike them or march them up the board? Because dealing with them will depend on the answer. In general though, if you can draw good line of sight on most objectives his DG should have a hard time against you, just focus on gunning down his troops/Termies first and leave the vehicles for later. They are though but should not be able to contest you on objectives on their own.
As for all my advice: do take in consideration I play pure DG without a Knight so I'm not exactly sure how the inclusion of one changes the way the list is played (against).

 Argive wrote:
So i imagine he is running something like this:

Spoiler:

++ Battalion Detachment -3CP (Chaos - Death Guard) [107 PL, -3CP, 1,830pts] ++

+ Configuration +

Detachment CP [-3CP]

Plague Company

+ HQ +

Daemon Prince of Nurgle [8 PL, 160pts]: Hellforged sword

Malignant Plaguecaster [6 PL, 100pts]

+ Troops +

Chaos Cultists [3 PL, 60pts]
. 9x Chaos Cultist w/ Autogun: 9x Autogun
. Cultist Champion: Autogun

Chaos Cultists [3 PL, 60pts]
. 9x Chaos Cultist w/ Autogun: 9x Autogun
. Cultist Champion: Autogun

Plague Marines [7 PL, 90pts]
. Plague Champion: Boltgun, Plague knife
. 4x Plague Marine w/ boltgun: 4x Blight Grenades, 4x Boltgun, 4x Krak Grenades, 4x Plague knife

+ Elites +

Biologus Putrifier [4 PL, 65pts]

Blightlord Terminators [27 PL, 407pts]
. Blightlord Champion: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Combi-bolter, Flail of Corruption
. Blightlord Terminator: Combi-bolter, Flail of Corruption
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter

+ Fast Attack +

Myphitic Blight-haulers [21 PL, 300pts]
. Myphitic Blight-hauler: Missile launcher, Multi-melta
. Myphitic Blight-hauler: Missile launcher, Multi-melta
. Myphitic Blight-hauler: Missile launcher, Multi-melta

+ Heavy Support +

Plagueburst Crawler [8 PL, 170pts]: 2x Plaguespitter, Heavy slugger

Plagueburst Crawler [8 PL, 170pts]: 2x Plaguespitter, Heavy slugger

Plagueburst Crawler [8 PL, 170pts]: 2x Plaguespitter, Heavy slugger

+ Dedicated Transport +

Chaos Rhino [4 PL, 78pts]: Combi-bolter

++ Total: [107 PL, -3CP, 1,830pts] ++

Created with BattleScribe

I'm no expert on DG but I think this describes the army comp more or less as you have said it? Maybe +/- a few options = 50pts ?.

You'd have to shave 250pts from this list in order to fit a knight.

A knight rampager is 415pts. There is no way hes fitting all that in at 2k pts just looking at the numbers.

Interested to know your thought OP.

have those untis seen a points increase since the codex first came out?

BrianDavion wrote:

 Argive wrote:
So i imagine he is running something like this:

Spoiler:

++ Battalion Detachment -3CP (Chaos - Death Guard) [107 PL, -3CP, 1,830pts] ++

+ Configuration +

Detachment CP [-3CP]

Plague Company

+ HQ +

Daemon Prince of Nurgle [8 PL, 160pts]: Hellforged sword

Malignant Plaguecaster [6 PL, 100pts]

+ Troops +

Chaos Cultists [3 PL, 60pts]
. 9x Chaos Cultist w/ Autogun: 9x Autogun
. Cultist Champion: Autogun

Chaos Cultists [3 PL, 60pts]
. 9x Chaos Cultist w/ Autogun: 9x Autogun
. Cultist Champion: Autogun

Plague Marines [7 PL, 90pts]
. Plague Champion: Boltgun, Plague knife
. 4x Plague Marine w/ boltgun: 4x Blight Grenades, 4x Boltgun, 4x Krak Grenades, 4x Plague knife

+ Elites +

Biologus Putrifier [4 PL, 65pts]

Blightlord Terminators [27 PL, 407pts]
. Blightlord Champion: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Combi-bolter, Flail of Corruption
. Blightlord Terminator: Combi-bolter, Flail of Corruption
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter
. Blightlord Terminator: Bubotic Axe, Combi-bolter

+ Fast Attack +

Myphitic Blight-haulers [21 PL, 300pts]
. Myphitic Blight-hauler: Missile launcher, Multi-melta
. Myphitic Blight-hauler: Missile launcher, Multi-melta
. Myphitic Blight-hauler: Missile launcher, Multi-melta

+ Heavy Support +

Plagueburst Crawler [8 PL, 170pts]: 2x Plaguespitter, Heavy slugger

Plagueburst Crawler [8 PL, 170pts]: 2x Plaguespitter, Heavy slugger

Plagueburst Crawler [8 PL, 170pts]: 2x Plaguespitter, Heavy slugger

+ Dedicated Transport +

Chaos Rhino [4 PL, 78pts]: Combi-bolter

++ Total: [107 PL, -3CP, 1,830pts] ++

Created with BattleScribe

I'm no expert on DG but I think this describes the army comp more or less as you have said it? Maybe +/- a few options = 50pts ?.

You'd have to shave 250pts from this list in order to fit a knight.

A knight rampager is 415pts. There is no way hes fitting all that in at 2k pts just looking at the numbers.

Interested to know your thought OP.

have those untis seen a points increase since the codex first came out?

They did, but the points values in the spoiler seem correct for the current game. So yeah depending on what Knight we are talking about (an armiger?) he should not have the points for one ina 2K game. And again, 2 flails in an 8 man squad is illegal for Terminators.