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I've been playing a nurgle demons list and have been coming up against a brick wall when dealing with multiple units of nobs.

My opponent plays a mechanized ork force with a mix of BWs and trukks. He usually includes 2 10 man units of nobs in either trukks or BWs. The nobs are usually armed with 6 big choppas, 3 pks and a painboy, with mixed wargear options to make them unique and use wound allocation to it's fullest extent.

I usually run a GUO, epidemius, 1 squad of 7 beasts, 3-4 squads of PBs 7-10 strong in each squad, and 3 very tooled up DPs with wings, strength, iron hide, MoN, cloud of flies.

The DPs are my heavy hitters that usually do the most toward running up the tally of epidemius against most armies I face. The problem here is that they can't usually last more than one round of combat with a squad of these nobs. Really nothing in my list can deal with them.

I have tried subbing out my GUO and some PBs and adding Ku'gath in their place to use his large blast attack against the nobs but he generally gets one shot off with it and then gets charged or they charge something else.

I've been working on a slaaneshi theme'd army for a bit now. I'd like to tune it up to try and deal with this ork army. I'll be playing against these orks quite often in the future. Looking at the options I have available I'm thinking of getting 3 soul grinders and giving them both phlem and tongue. They can use the str 10 shots to attack ork vehicles early on and then the str 8 templates to focus on wiping out the nobs. I am thinking of also going with 3 full 20 man squads of deamonettes. They should be able to deal with the 20 strong units of boyz that come out of the battlewagons, even if they get charged. Then maybe a Keeper for an HQ and a unit of fiends thrown in to go after his lootas.

I have one soul grinder as it stands. Am I wasting my money by going out and buying two more to take down this army, or am I finally going to be able to get this monkey off my back?

The soul grinder option to me definitely sounds like a better option then DPs to deal with nob mobs. You have a better chance of popping their transport before they get too close and drop pie plates on them which will insta-kill nobs. Sounds good to me but we will see what others will say before going with that as i am not the best 40k player in the world and make mistakes of going with stuff that looks good on paper but may not do the greatest on the field.

It seems to me that mono-God lists tend to suffer from a lack of versatility.

Soulgrinders are good, since they can insta-kill the nobz.

I think you would do well with some Bloodletters or Bloodcrushers or something though. If you get the charge on those nobz with something like that they should be able to tear them to shreds since they have Power Weapons.

Templates that can insta-kill nobs make them very sad. Keep in mind that a nob squad like you're describing is 600 points or so. Its a brutal squad. If you can plop a couple of templates onto it, add in some AP2 weaponry if you have any...you'll have them licked.

A full squad of nobs can take down even 12 plague bearers through Dakkaguns, massed attacks (Pk, Big choppa & normal) and finally No Retreat.. 8-10 death's will kill of the rest. So smaller more versitile squads is what I'd suggest.

The Tallyman wouldn't be effective due to the relatively small number of models fielded by Nob biker lists, the above mentioned in-effectiveness of PB's in assault (as they most benefit from the Tally) and he steals up a useful HQ slot.

GUO's are cheap and resilient enough, I think, to withstand a nob charge - As defensive grenades, WS6, 4++ & 4+ FNP greatly reduces the amount of wounds taken from the nobs. (3 pk nobs = 1.9 unsaved. guns deal 0.8. 5 normal nobs deal 0.8 & 2 Big choppah nobz deal 0.3 so 3.9/5 roughly ) But that does mean they will go down during the your assault phase although you will get to swing first as the pk's will finish you off after the other attacks lacking furious charge would mostly bounce off of toughness & dual 4+ saves. But as they cant keep them realistically for 2 full turns (i.e more than 2 assault turns) and as they do little damage in return, thirsters may win.)

On the other hand, the more expensive blood thirsters with a strength upgrade would rip the works to piece's before they even got to swing. That is to say he should ID about 3 nobs before being brought down in the same assault due to the lack of FNP (which is better than a 3+ armour compared to 4+ invunerable plus only 4 wounds). That could actually be beneficial as the squad would be left hanging during your turn (if they assault your Blood Thirster) allowing them to be shelled/attacked more.

I would invest in a pair of walkers with both tongue and phleghm. Tongue can pop the battlewagons and once the nobs are walking they should be much easier to handle. I wouldn't even bother charging the walker into the nobs, just keep dropping pie plates on them.

G

Bloodthirster is a beast against Nobz. A Bloodthirster or two supported by Soul Grinders should make Nobs cry. For another twist, or to add to the above, a slaaneshi herald/DP or the masque with mini-lash can put them into template formation for multiple phlegm's.

EDIT:

Keeping with your Nurgle theme, Kugath + 3x Grinders seems like the ticket. Also, if you're going Slaanesh anyway, it's really easy to drop the Masque or Slaanesh Heralds in there.

A Keeper of Secrets couldn't hurt either, if want to add Slaanesh..

Monster Rain wrote:A Keeper of Secrets couldn't hurt either, if want to add Slaanesh..

The KoS isn't S8, which is what you need against Nobz.

whitedragon wrote:Bloodthirster is a beast against Nobz. A Bloodthirster or two supported by Soul Grinders should make Nobs cry.

I don't think it's the best counter because Nobs can be WS5, thus more or less negating his ultra weapon skill, and Big Choppas plus Power Klaws will totally murder him, even if he does go first and instant death 3 or 4 Nobz.

Soul Grinders and Blood Crushers are better use of the points but YMMV.

sourclams wrote:

whitedragon wrote:Bloodthirster is a beast against Nobz. A Bloodthirster or two supported by Soul Grinders should make Nobs cry.

I don't think it's the best counter because Nobs can be WS5, thus more or less negating his ultra weapon skill, and Big Choppas plus Power Klaws will totally murder him, even if he does go first and instant death 3 or 4 Nobz.

Soul Grinders and Blood Crushers are better use of the points but YMMV.

The Soul Grinders are a must anyway, but I'm not sure that any lone thing has a chance against a full ten man nob squad. The BT with wings and Soul Grinder's fleet should allow you to catch the nobs with both, which should spell doom for them.

The crushers are a tad more resilient, but even with a fully diverse squad, only 5 wounds coming back are enough to start removing models, where as the crushers will be hard pressed to remove even 2 from a fully kitted nob squad. They don't even take a model if the orks have cybork bodies.

Once again, you can't attack them with any one thing and expect to win. I think any combination of Crushers/Grinders/Thirsters could take them out. The Grinders and Thirsters are more mobile and can expect to get the charge better, and the large footprint of an 8 man crusher squad can make it difficult to get all models in contact in certain situations.

I may be remembering incorrectly but do slaaneshi daemons have anything like the chaos lord's daemon weapon blissgiver that instakill whatever takes a wound from them or do 2 wounds to multiwound creatures per wound like tyranid implant attacks?

@Culler: Slaaneshi demons all pretty much have fleet and rending. They don't have anything like the blissgiver.

So it looks like I'll be getting a couple soul grinders then. I'll be running 3 with both phlem and tongue in my nurgle list. At 185 they each come in 40 points cheaper than my tooled up DPs I have been using. With that addition I'll be dropping epidemius as the grinders can't add to the tally. That frees up 230 points so far.

I think I'll drop the beasts of nurgle as well. That is another 245 points freed. I could add two slaaneshi heralds with pavane each in a unit of demonettes. The idea of using pavane to aid the grinders sounds good. I could also just do one unit of demonettes with herald and a Keeper of Secrets. I know the keeper isn't an answer to the nobs but he can still wreck units of boys and can use pavane. I'll probably try it both ways and see how it goes.

So my list will look something like this:

Ku'gath

KoS

3x7 PBs

12 demonettes w/ herald

3 sould grinders with phlem and tongue

That gives me 4 pie plates to work with. I'll keep my pbs in cover and on objectives and let everyone else do the dirty work.

The problem with Pavanne, is that it can only move a unit D6", and it counts as shooting. So that means that a unit like the KoS, which you want in CC, has to forego moving and fleeting and charging into CC to use Pavanne instead, making him one big sitting target for a turn. That is the reason to divide up with Heralds, as you can afford to have them not charge, and it gives you another Pavanne.

augustus5 wrote:@Culler: Slaaneshi demons all pretty much have fleet and rending. They don't have anything like the blissgiver.

So it looks like I'll be getting a couple soul grinders then. I'll be running 3 with both phlem and tongue in my nurgle list. At 185 they each come in 40 points cheaper than my tooled up DPs I have been using. With that addition I'll be dropping epidemius as the grinders can't add to the tally. That frees up 230 points so far.

I think I'll drop the beasts of nurgle as well. That is another 245 points freed. I could add two slaaneshi heralds with pavane each in a unit of demonettes. The idea of using pavane to aid the grinders sounds good. I could also just do one unit of demonettes with herald and a Keeper of Secrets. I know the keeper isn't an answer to the nobs but he can still wreck units of boys and can use pavane. I'll probably try it both ways and see how it goes.

So my list will look something like this:

Ku'gath

KoS

3x7 PBs

12 demonettes w/ herald

3 sould grinders with phlem and tongue

That gives me 4 pie plates to work with. I'll keep my pbs in cover and on objectives and let everyone else do the dirty work.

A couple of suggestions and comments. First you can't have a herald and 2 greater daemons?? Maybe just a typo there.

For a whopping total of 3 points a model you can upgrade the daemonettes to seekers, getting an extra attack and cavalry movement as part of the bargain.

I really like the idea of Ku'gath but I think he's just way too expensive. What i personally really like are great unclean ones, with cloud of flies. Extremly difficult to kill and cheap to boot. If you swap out both daemons for guo's that will free up around 200 points. Which you could then use to do the seeker upgrades, and add in either 2 units of flamers (which give nob's fits like you wouldn't believe). Or if you want to only add in slaanesh stuff, put in some fiends. fiends are great for wrecking rear av10 vehicles and work well in conjunction with great unclean ones and soul grinders. Basically you charge in the fiends into an existing combat. They chew on stuff, take their attacks back (hopefully minimized because everyone is in base to base with your other nasties). And then jump behind the soul grinder with their hit and run.

I also approve of the GUO, they stick down the nobs & remove any awesome mobility they may have. He also removes a massive amount of clout they can bring to bear but to let him live longer than 2 assault rounds (you do not want the nobs to finish off your GUO during your own assault phase if they get the charge the turn before) you need to knock a few units off by either flaming the unit and loading it up on wounds to allow the GUO to actually remove models or emply a Soul Grinders Pie & CC attacks.