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Hey folks,

I've bought some models and am starting to assemble/paint a Death Guard army. Right now I have

- the Nurgle Demon Prince model (half painted)
- 1 box of CSM
- 1 box of CSM which will be converted with the forgeworld set to be plague marines
- 1 plastic terminator lord in the box
- some old nurgle havocs and plague marine models (optional to use these or not)
- I like the look of the Vindicator and am thinking of adding it

I just have some general questions about Nurgle:

What "style" of army should I be building? For example, I know Khorne wants a very assault-based CC style of army. For Nurgle, do I focus on shooting basically? For example, I was going to give the CSM troops Heavy Bolters.

What should or should not be given to the Lord as weapons etc? I had a previous nurgle lord with 2 lightning claws. It occurs to me that was a bad choice.

Any "must takes" for Death Guard? I'm angling to get to 500-750 points and then kick it up from there. Any input is greatly appreciated.

Well if you want to play "pure" Death Guard, the best way to do this (though maybe not the best tactical choice), is use only Pleague Marines as troops and you might wanna consider not using a Havoc Squad at all, since they can only have the mark, but not the rest of the stuff Pleague Marines have like FnP or pleague grenades.

Since there is sadly no longer any rule for holy numbers, the most effective way to use Pleague Marines is probably to use large squads and let the enemy come to you. Nurgle Marines are slower than most other meqs, but they make up for it with the Pleague Grenades.

Plasma guns are a pretty good choice considering that PMs have a better chance of surviving overheating thanks to their Feel no Pain rule.

I'll point out that Chaos Space Marines cannot have the Mark of Nurgle. They can only have the Icon of Nurgle, which is different. The Icon gives the squad carrying it the benefit of the Mark of Nurgle until the model equipped with the Icon buys it, then the squad gets zilch. On the plus side, it's an Icon and can be used to summon Lesser Daemons, and give Terminators and Obliterators a teleport beacon.

I'd say Typhus is a must-have for a Death Guard army.

The Havocs are a good idea because they work well in large squads, with lots of special weapons and lots of regular Marines to catch bullets. Since the cost of an Icon of Nurgle is constant, you'll essentially get +1T for each model for 2pts apiece if you have twenty Marines. Also, they fight at I4 and killing Orks is better than hoping that defensive grenades mean they don't pummel you as badly. The extra bodies will mean fewer Morale checks for shooting casualties, more power to defend against assaults, and more spares to sacrifice so that their expensive squadmates can continue to do Nurgle's work.

Cool - yep, I was going to use an Icon of Nurgle. I'm not really going for pure DeathGuard, just a "fluffy" Nurgle Force.

Nurglitch propably has a point there when it comes to tactics. I'm just still pissed how GW ruined my Death Guard army I build on the las 'Dex.

PMs backed by a Warptime Nurgle DP are pretty potent. You can get some support from Oblits/Havocs/Whatever.

I saw Deathguard and came running. You will always be caught wanting for models as a Nurgle follower (barring daemon fodder). Papa Nurgle blesses his children with the tools they need however! Nurgle's Rot will DESTROY T3 swarmy units. It's less effective against Orks, but only by about 17%. Against MEQ's it is almost useless, except that you can make them take an extra save or two. Also, if you don't get Typhus (and I recomend you do) a Nurgle Lord with termy armor and a daemon wep will kill anything it touches and take vast amounts of punishment. Throw in some Nurgle Termies with power weapons and a chainfist or two, you have a rockhard bunch of shocktroops. Deathguard are footsloggers by fluff, so a landraider might be out of the question. If you mostly Plague Marines and no Rhino's you make enemy anti-tank have not much to shoot at. I tend to take a fairly large squad of CSM with no upgrades but a Nurgle Icon and Champ (I use a Greater Daemon) as fodder in lower games. The only problem of having so little in the way of vehicles is that the enemy is forced to fire all anti-tank at your Daemon Prince. At your points range though, this won't be much and he'll likely shrug it off.

Typhus with some T5 Terminators in a Land Raider with a Warptime Daemon Prince and 4-6 Oblits filling the rest of your points with Plaguemarines in Rhinos with Havoc Launchers is a wicked hard army.

Maybe a squad of 3 Oblits or two squads of 2, either with Vindicator. Vindicators help bust swarms (and honestly anything else). Take one if you can find the points while still running a couple squads of 7 or so Plaguemarines will help you at your points level. Espec if someone brings a Landraider (and some jerk will).

DarkHound wrote:I saw Deathguard and came running. You will always be caught wanting for models as a Nurgle follower (barring daemon fodder). Papa Nurgle blesses his children with the tools they need however! Nurgle's Rot will DESTROY T3 swarmy units. It's less effective against Orks, but only by about 17%. Against MEQ's it is almost useless, except that you can make them take an extra save or two. Also, if you don't get Typhus (and I recomend you do) a Nurgle Lord with termy armor and a daemon wep will kill anything it touches and take vast amounts of punishment. Throw in some Nurgle Termies with power weapons and a chainfist or two, you have a rockhard bunch of shocktroops. Deathguard are footsloggers by fluff, so a landraider might be out of the question. If you mostly Plague Marines and no Rhino's you make enemy anti-tank have not much to shoot at. I tend to take a fairly large squad of CSM with no upgrades but a Nurgle Icon and Champ (I use a Greater Daemon) as fodder in lower games. The only problem of having so little in the way of vehicles is that the enemy is forced to fire all anti-tank at your Daemon Prince. At your points range though, this won't be much and he'll likely shrug it off.

One thing I'm not clear on - if you take a Daemon Weapon, which uses 2 hands, you can't take a gun right?

As far as I know, you still take your gun. There is an entry covering it in the rule book. You just don't get the offhand bonus from having another weapon/pistol. You wouldn't get that bonus if you had terminator armor anyway (TL Bolter not being a pistol).

If you have a 2-handed weapon, you don't get the bonus attack for having an extra weapon (since your other hand is kind of pre-ocupied). You can still fire your gun when not in CC however. As DarkHound said, it's impossible to get an extra attack anyway since all of their melee weapons are 'Special,' meaning a pistol will never give you an extra attack, only having a duplicate of said special weapon will (e.g., You only get a bonus attack with a Power fist through wielding a second Power fist, as far as I know only Angry Marines can do that).

And Termies can't take pistols anyway and don't have True Grit so you're screwed for bonus weapons attacks in any situation except Dual Lightning Claws.

Nurglitch wrote:I'll point out that Chaos Space Marines cannot have the Mark of Nurgle. They can only have the Icon of Nurgle, which is different. The Icon gives the squad carrying it the benefit of the Mark of Nurgle until the model equipped with the Icon buys it, then the squad gets zilch. On the plus side, it's an Icon and can be used to summon Lesser Daemons, and give Terminators and Obliterators a teleport beacon.

Incorrect. Chaos Space Marines can easily have the Mark of Nurgle.

"Icon of Nurgle - all models in the unit, except Independant Characters joining the unit, have the Mark of Nurgle."

The Mark of Nurgle does not grant Feel No Pain though.

Feel No Pain is just a special ability that only Plague Marines have. Bikers w/ Mark of Nurgle don't have it. Daemon Princes w/ Mark of Nurgle don't have it. Etc.

Yep. You could give normal CSM with the Mark of Nurgle to give them T5. But they'd still be severely outclassed by Plague Marines.

MarvinGayeIsMyDaddy wrote:Yep. You could give normal CSM with the Mark of Nurgle to give them T5. But they'd still be severely outclassed by Plague Marines.

Yeah, I see the downside to "elite" nurgle squads such as Nurgle Bikers, Nurgle Raptors, etc. is they're only slightly tougher, and no increase in offensive power.

You look at something like Nobz or Nob Bikers. They're defensively much better than normal troops. They're also offensively much better than normal troops.

This makes them "elite"

On the other hand, nurgle bikers. They're defensively better than normal troops (except Plague Marines, which they aren't tougher than.) They're offensively not really better than normal troops.
This makes em not really "elite" like the units point cost ends up portraying.

The Icon of Nurgle isn't very economical, either.

10 CSM w/ IoN and no frills = 200 points.
10 Plague Marines w/ no frills = 230 points.

So for 3 more points per model you get Feel No Pain, Fearless, and Defensive Grenades.

Go Plague Marines!

I agree with you there Democratus. But you can cut down the cost of it per marine by making the squad bigger. It only works for me because I use them as a screening unit in bigger games so my Plague Marines don't get mashed by Battle Cannons. And yes, I don't take my Plague Marines in Rhino's (most of the time) because it's a part of my bigger strat. Ah well.

I see what you're saying. But the lack of Fearless still spooks me away. If they are being used as a screen, then they will take losses and will have to roll against falling back.

And even at large numbers you can do quite well with the cult.

20 Nurgle CSM: 350 pts
15 Plague Marines: 345 pts

Surely a Fearless 15-strong screening unit with Feel No Pain can do as well as a 20-strong unit without?

In the end, results speak for themselves. If you like what you're doing then you already win!

Yeah, towards 1850 when this really becomes an issue I take a cheap Lord (who gives them Fearless) and midigate wounds off him as much as I can. If everyone else dies, he falls back into the PM squad. It works, and Plague Marines are the better option, but CSM are cheaper and have more bits for weapons and starting new sects devoute to other Gods.