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How do you, the citizens of dakka kit out a Chaos Daemons, Daemon Prince?

For anyone who plays CD the Daemon Prince has a ridiculous ammount of options and customizibilty as opposed to the CSM Daemon Prince who has few options and things like wings are mandatory to be good.

I tend to run my daemon princes heavy in poitns. My favorite builds are Unholy Might, Iron Hide, Wings, Mark of Nurgle/Tzeentch. It comes out to around 220 points, but it usually pays off.

The power build is probably Mark of Nurgle, Iron Hide, Wings, Noxious Touch, Cloud of Flies for over 200 points but you have a damn tough unit. Who is quite good at tearing up other MCs.

Khorne and Slaanesh DPs aren't very powerful, not because they're bad but because they have to compete with Soulgrinders who can do much the same thing for similar prices.

Some people like to build Tz DPs as gun platforms. I think it depends on the rest of your army and whether or not you need shooting. To cheapen a Tz DP I think you can get by without Iron Hide if you need those points.

I have seen gun platform Tzeentch DP's and i cannot find how that is a good use of a DP who is quite clearly a CC unit.

BS 5 only seems appropriate for a DP as he is a champion of chaos gifted to daemonhood by the Chaos Gods but does BS 5 really justify using him as a gun? For 250 points a lord of change seems a vasty superior use of points. A lord of change gets BS 5, T6, a 3++, a force weapon, and more guns. A lord of change still retains its winged movement, IC status, S6, 4 wounds and MC status. It is the loss of an HQ spot, but if more ranged fire is needed a Lord of Change is a far better unit than the comparable Daemon Prince.

mrwittwer wrote:I have seen gun platform Tzeentch DP's and i cannot find how that is a good use of a DP who is quite clearly a CC unit.

BS 5 only seems appropriate for a DP as he is a champion of chaos gifted to daemonhood by the Chaos Gods but does BS 5 really justify using him as a gun? For 250 points a lord of change seems a vasty superior use of points. A lord of change gets BS 5, T6, a 3++, a force weapon, and more guns. A lord of change still retains its winged movement, IC status, S6, 4 wounds and MC status. It is the loss of an HQ spot, but if more ranged fire is needed a Lord of Change is a far better unit than the comparable Daemon Prince.

Actually, I did quite well with a Tzeentch DP in a tournament recently. He is a close combat god alone (WS 7, 4 attacks that ignore armor saves), but when he lands, normally he's useless. Giving him Bolt of Tzeentch and Breath of Chaos makes him devastating even the turn that he lands. Once he lands, you can Bolt a rhino or something and then assault whatever pours out.

However, I have been recently running a Nurgle daemons army and I generally run him with Iron Hide, Mark of Nurgle, Noxious Touch and Cloud of Flies. I took off Aura of Decay from my Great Unclean One and Prince to get another Bloodcrusher (I call them Plaguecrushers), and I will never do that again. My team played Tyranids in all three team games and I was kicking myself for removing a 20 point shooting weapon that can hit while the prince is in CC, and hits everything within 6", even if it is only Str. 2.

So, in short, now I use Iron Hide, Mark of Nurgle, Noxious Touch, Cloud of Flies and Aura of Decay.

mrwittwer wrote:I have seen gun platform Tzeentch DP's and i cannot find how that is a good use of a DP who is quite clearly a CC unit.

Yes DPs excell in CC. But you have to look at economics as well. The LoC costs 250 points. A DP with MOT, and Bolt 140. That DP still has 4 eternal warrior wounds, a 4++ save, still rips through a lot in CC and costs a lot less. Wings are very valuable, but with Daemonic Assault and the fact that your whole army is rather in your face, the wings arent as needed to cross large amounts of wasteland (compare for instance to a Spearhear mission where you shooty opponent deploys on the edge of his deploymentzone and your CSM DP has to cross 30+" to make an impact).

Cilithan

The biggest issue with using a shooty DP is simply whether or not a Soulgrinder would perform better in the same role.

Anti-MEQ? Gaze is a cheaper and still powerful option compared to Phlegm.
Anti-tank? Tongue vs Bolt is hard, neither of them are awesome enough to really rely on. I'd go with Bolt for light armor due to the superior BS value.
Anti-Terminator? The only really good option is Breath, but I don't know how much I trust a template weapon on a walking model.
Anti-horde? I'd have to give it to the Soulgrinder, even naked Vomit + Harvester is alot of firepower. Add in Phlegm and you will be knocking off alot more infantry then a Tz DP could.

However, a soulgrinder comes at a hefty price being that it is the only vehicle and a large one at that. Generally this means all anti-armor is poured onto them right away.

I dont actually have the model, and i wish i did, because i wonder how much better armor 13 on the soulgrinder works, as opposed to armor 12 on the defiler.

mrwittwer wrote:However, a soulgrinder comes at a hefty price being that it is the only vehicle and a large one at that. Generally this means all anti-armor is poured onto them right away.

I dont actually have the model, and i wish i did, because i wonder how much better armor 13 on the soulgrinder works, as opposed to armor 12 on the defiler.

From my own experience, I can say that the 1 point difference in armor is like night and day. The only problem I had with Soulgrinders is that they deep strike and that they are big models. It's a good thing they're fleet so you can deep strike them far enough away to keep safe if the board is packed.

I run Mono-Tz Daemons with Fateweaver and Princes in a MoTZ, Bolt, Gaze, Hide build.

The princes are needed there for assault support, though.

Basically, it comes down to what's in your list. Grinders do better in some builds, DPs in others.