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HQ
Skarbrand, The Exiled One
BloodThirster

Elites
Flamers x3
Bolt of Tzeentch

Troops
Plaguebearers x5 Icon
Plaguebearers x5 Icon

Plaguebearers x5
Plaguebearers x5

Bloodletters x10

Heavy
Daemon Prince x3
Flight
Iron Hide
Mark of Nurgle
Noxious Touch
Cloud of Flies

1840 points (probably throw Instrument of chaos or some other point filler in)

This is the theory, please feel free to pick it apart as you see fit.

Skarbrand is there to increase the overall effectiveness of my mostly Initiative 5 assault force. The troops provide the anvil to my MC hammer and all of my big guys have an armor save of 3+/4++ or 3+/5++ combined with T6 to help resist the massive hail of bullets. Cloud will make my Nurgle princes the cover clearers and probably tossing them up front against horde armies because of the defensive grenades. I can counter charge with the Thirsters and the Bloodletters. Daemon Princes with preferred enemy and the re-roll from noxious touch will be effectively causing 4-5 wounds on the charge at initiative above MEQ and taking very few unsaved wounds back.

Bloodletters are there to clear out a good portion of horde armies as a second wave assault force. A unit of 10 within range of Skarbrand will cause on average 17-18 power weapon wounds at initiative 5 against MEQ weapon skill and toughness. Without preferred enemy you would only be causing about 13.

Plaguebearers are there to hold objectives obviously. There will, theoretically, be too many threats to focus on these guys that come down in the second wave. Without power weapons factored in, it will take 67.5 MEQ bolter shots or HtH attacks to kill a single 5 man plaguebearer squad without combat res or special weapon attacks... and that's outside of cover without going to ground(going to ground in cover will require 135 attacks averaged out). 270 attacks to take out all of my objective holders in open ground.

Against tanks, there are 3 str 5 MC's with 4/5 attacks each, 1 str 7/8 MC with 5/6 attacks (all with wings) and 1 str 8/9 MC with 6/7 attacks along with a 3 man flamer unit with Bolt. Due to new vehicle assault rules, if I can manage to stun any of the vehicles on my turn (either in HtH or flamer auto glances), I get to attack them if I'm in BTB with them next turn, making them auto hit in CC for not moving.

In regards to swarms, I was thinking of taking some of the points to put Aura of Decay on my DPs. Rolls of 5 to wound t3 within 6 inches and 6's to wound t4 isn't too terrible for a free auto hitting shooting attack every turn.

interesting, I'd never considered building a daemonzilla list around Skarbrand. I imagine it would be very effective indeed. Skarbrand's Rage Embodied lets you reroll missed attacks on tanks, no less! The big concern I think would be that you'd have to keep your guys bunched up, and then you'll be eating pie plates and anti-tank pretty hard. The other concern would be things like horde ork, and stealer shock, both of which will just drag you down in melee. In both cases, skarbrand's special power is going to bite you on the ass, hard (especially the genestealers, going at I6.)

Frankly, your MCs don't really need any help in CC, what I'd do to make this list nice and beardy is scrape another 33 points up (the bolt on the flamers would be my first stop), and run Fateweaver instead. That way all your MCs are rerolling their 3+ saves, everything is winged, and fateweaver can hurl blistering death while you pop around the board. Then you start running into questions like taking mark of nurgle off your daemon princes because no one's ever going to shoot at them until fateweaver's gone, but then you lose noxious and cloud, and we enter a whole new realm of flying tzeentch princes, where your army has 4 BS5 gazes and bolts a turn.

This is my proposal, I just used your list as a mental jumping off point. You've heard of Tzeentch's flying circus, well I call this one....


NURGLE'S FLYING CIRCUS
HQ
Bloodthirster - Unholy Might - 270
Fateweaver - 333

Troops

Plaguebearer x10 icon 175
Plaguebearer x10 icon 175

Plaguebearer x8 120
Plaguebearer x8 120


Heavy Support
Daemon Prince - Wings, Hide, MoN, Cloud, Noxious 215
Daemon Prince - Wings, Hide, MoN, Cloud, Noxious 215
Daemon Prince - Wings, Hide, MoN, Cloud, Noxious 215


This list saddles you to the typical lynchpin syndrome of fateweaver lists. However, 36 plaguebearers won't get pulled off your objectives. period. What you do with the squads as they are, once you take a look at the condition/quality of the opposing scoring units, you either double up on 2 objectives, or you split yourself between any number of them. 18 plaguebearers going to ground REALLY aren't getting off any objectives. Besides, no one will be shooting at them with your quintet of flying death on the board.

Alternately, you could cut back on the admittedly overkill number of bearers, and put some sort of shooty death on the princes: aura, gaze, or breath. They're all great at what they do, and all serve different purposes. Here's a fun, disgusting thing to note btw. Prince(s) are fighting some orks, but not killing fast enough? Put Fateweaver next to it, and unload with boon of mutation/aura of decay. Both can eat up a melee without being in it (though boon is for picking out those dirty PK/PF sergeants), and fateweaver can keep on blasting whatever else he likes due to master of sorcery/we are legion.

Damn you Shaggoth, it looks like I have some proxy'ing to do

Stealer usually have feeder tendrils anyway. So the re-rolls will still benefit you. MC getting rerolls would be beneficial as they will cause more casuallty's needing only 2's most times to wound.

I was actually thinking about using Fateweaver. The added survivability across the army would be much higher. As it is right now, power fists are the only things I'm truly worried about in this list because you can't pick them out. Giving the DP's Boon would solve that issue though. Vs. MC's I can usually get the charge off and the DP's will hit on 3's with a reroll and wound on 2's vs. Carnifexes with 5 attacks. Unless there is a Bone Sword nearby, they will usually bite it without getting to attack back a good portion of the time. If I'm really worried, I'll just double up MC's or send Skarbrand at em.

Orks, even with a reroll will only worry me with powerfists. Even then, it won't bother me much with Fateweaver there if I can keep him out of combat. Nids, depending on the build, will be irritating but not unbeatable. I'll have most of it put together soon. I'll let you guys know how it goes.