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See I'd say the Elites are the armies best bit, Crushers, FLamers and Fiends are all amazing, the beasts are not so great.

bloodletters may be worthless, but daemonettes are gold against the dreadnaughts and wraithlords, or you send something else at them like a bloodthirster. In a daemon army it's all about building a list that has the tools to take on any type of unit, and the tools the grinder and prince bring are not nearly as good as the tools that other units have (to do the same job) I hope that makes sense

I'm not discounting the av13 just that av 13 doesn't stand up to melta guns, ignoring shaken and stunned doesn't do much when they have a 66% chance to neutralize you (a 3 immobilizes you and a 4+ kills you with melta) a dedicated anti tank unit will probably get rid of this guy since he's the only tank you have

a daemon prince and soulgrinder at best have 11 attacks against a vehicle, assuming you need 6's to hit if it moved fast enough i'd rather have 2 units of bloodletters or daemonettes, and throw around 80- 90 dice to hit a vehicle, hell i'd rather throw around 80-90 dice on any vehicle anytime.

the exception being the land raider but there are better things than a daemon prince and soulgrinder to kill them.

I'm also not sure how a soulgrinder survives against a mech eldar army?? between firedragons, bright lances, and autarch with fusion guns i would think they would shoot them dead. and barring that when you charge a tank with a soulgrinder i'm surprised that other tanks don't jump to behind the soul grinder and shoot his rear armor.

I don't believe bunches of vehicles give daemons fits since bloodletters, daemonettes, bloodcrushers, bloodthirsters, screamers, seekers, fleshhounds, heralds, greater daemons, all can kill a vehicle quite handily (hitting on rear armor is awesome for this army) and in almost every case the above units have far more attacks to try and kill a unit, and are far more survivable that a single prince or soulgrinder. (now I wouldn't take some of the above units but im sure somebody somewhere likes them)

Having faced Daemons a few times I can say that the Soul Grinder scares me more than anything in that list. Everything else I can shoot or assault to death but an AV13 vehicle that ignores most of the damage table is INCREDIBLY hard to take down. Especially if your opponent is taking 2-3 of them.

Ozymandias, King of Kings

What I would play with daemons.

HQ
2 keeper of secrets with musk, 7 attacks on the charge, monsterous creatures, hit and run = awesome.

Troops
2 units of 18-20 daemonettes with icons
1 unit of 9+ nurgle with icon to hold my objective

Heavy
3 grinders with pleghm

this is at 1750pts

1) the Heavy Grinders lay down the pie plates
2) the keepers with their massive number of attacks take care of targets for me.
3) the daemonettes are huge squads, meaning they won't die first turn they are out and have the numbers to take things down if needed. Yes I know Blood letters would be better... but they are more expensive

eh, I don't like the small units people seem to be running. I think this is a bit more competitive

Screamers are quite effective. Drop them behind something, or near fateweaver, preferably both. You'll get very little direct fire on them, as people are concentrating on fateweaver and the flamers you landed next to their units, wiping them out (you did bring flamers, right?) You may not be close enough to eat a tank the next round, as it's doubtfull you DS'd next to a tank in the enemy zhone, but you turboboost toward them, so now you have a 3+ cover and a 4+ invulnerable. Next round you eat vehicles. At 16 points a screamer, bring 3 units of 5, you're not much more expensive than one tooled out soulgrinder, cheaper than most DPs, are typically more resilient (No one hit kills against you), and can be used to tie things up.

I typically run fateweaver, 2-3 units of 3 flamers, an even mix of bloodletters and horrors (if I have to take more of one than the other I take the extra in bloodletters), and 2-3 units of screamers (points depending). If I get a few extra points I throw in a couple of heralds of tzeentch on chariots, with icon and breath. So far (at least after I got the DS distance down), it's been doing very well (SM's, Mech Tau, IG (mech and a mixture - no straight up gunline yet, Necron and orc opponents) winning most, the losses pretty much coming down to 1 die roll.

AgeOfEgos wrote:

Tortuga932 wrote:umm you do realize screamers are awesome, and seekers can be very good, assault marines are good, everybody used tornadoes until 5th came out, hellhounds are abundant, warpspiders are used, pathfinders in a tau army, grey knight teleport squads, raveners see much use in nids, seraphim for the sisters are widely used. so im confused why you think fast attack doesn't get used?


in the daemon army I actually don't like the heavy support section at all, if ever there was a weak section in that book it's there

Heh heh, screamers are awful guy. Oh, 6s to hit with 1 attack (When they cannot multirole) = fail.

The Heavy is the second best section of the Demon dex...with first being elites. I only call Elites first, as almost every choice there is a good one...with my order being Crushers--Flamers--Fiends--Beasts (Lets play the Sesame Street and see which one of those doesn't belong there..)

Only 6's to hit? A lot of people have that mistaken impression. I'm hitting on 4's, sometimes I don't even need to roll. If my opponent wants to go ahead and run his vehicles around so fast that that he's not getting any effective shooting from them (and only a few vehicles out there can move more than 6 and shoot at all), I'm more than happy to need 6's to hit him. So, run from the screamers and don't shoot, or, don't run, and I'll eat your tank that much sooner. Power of Machine spirit and Fast vehicles are only a slight concern, and since typically you're paying extra for that, I'm ok with it, as it's a larger chunk of your army(point wise) to take out when I do roll the 6. Trust me, with 15 screamers, the 6 comes up, and one hit is quite often all it takes. Additionally I don't care so much if I destroy the tank or not. It's better if it happens, but if not, I'm ok with an immobilize (get to autohit next time), or removing the main gun that's actually a potential worry.

let's be clear here...against most tanks, Daemons simply destroy them in hand to hand. That includes any tank that isn't AV14 all around. When we're talking about anti-tank in a Daemon force, we're really only talking about Land Raiders and Monoliths. Against both, screamers are simply epic-fail. Monoliths don't care about the meltabombs, and Land Raiders that are worrisome are going to be moving 12" a turn. Either way, screamers suck.

Sure, they can take down stationary tanks...but so can whole loads of stuff in the codex.

This complaining that Soul Grinders can be taken down with a single shot reminds me of people who claim that they don't like Terminators because they roll lots of ones.

See above your post concerning land raiders, if you're moving them, you're only getting one shot with PoMS. So I've neutralized half the weapons (at least) anyhow by making you run. And you can't outrun the screamers, so it's still possible to get through and stop you. A bit harder, but as long as you're wanting to play cat and mouse, I'm up for needing the 6 to get through. As for the monolith, uh, so? Take a monolith, I phase out the warriors the monolith goes away (been on both sides of that), so at worst I'm stunning it so it cant shoot the gauss arc, at best I'm immobilizing it so if you use it to give more WBB rolls to warriors, I know where they're going to go.

Actually, the biggest worry is walkers of anysort, as you can get locked in and only hit front, need 6's to hit unless they started stunned or immobilized, and they can hit back. But that's when it's better to have a 4+ invulnerable save instead of an armor value anyhow.

A Nurgle Demon Prince is a Character/MC/Vehicle killer in HtH. 3 DPs can go through a Nidzilla before the carnifexes can have a chance to swing back.

Bloodcrushers are the real stars of the Deamon codex due to their eternal warrior, T5, and +3 armor save.

Plague bearers when grouped in 14 man squads will usually take an army's worth of shooting to kill.

Soulgrinders do what Defilers are meant to do but way better and even more cost effective than a Defiler.

Fateweaver is luck dependent but will take the firepower of an army and laugh to the bank. (Dangerous with Bloodcrushers)

Khorne is the strongest of the Deamon armies followed by Nurgle, Tzeench, and finally Slaneesh. Most people I see that have problems with Deamons is because they geared their shooting against orks and anti-ork shooting can easily be shrugged off by Deamons outside of Slaneesh.

Oh and any army that can simply ignore the mission deployment rules is an army that controls the game. The Top builds for deamons seems to be with Bloodcrushers, Deamonzilla, Mixed, All Khorne.

dancingcricket wrote:See above your post concerning land raiders, if you're moving them, you're only getting one shot with PoMS. So I've neutralized half the weapons (at least) anyhow by making you run.

The danger of Land Raiders isn't their weaponry. It's whatever unit they're transporting inside.

Centurian99 wrote:

dancingcricket wrote:See above your post concerning land raiders, if you're moving them, you're only getting one shot with PoMS. So I've neutralized half the weapons (at least) anyhow by making you run.

The danger of Land Raiders isn't their weaponry. It's whatever unit they're transporting inside.

And I think this is the main problem that daemon armies have to face even with lowly transports. Sure there are tons of units that can pop a rhino, but how often will the rhino's payload be delivered. After all thats what they are paying 35-50 points for in the first place.

So the question is can you afford to pop the rhino in hth, dump the squad and be able to survive what the squad is going to dish back at you before you get to go again. This is why I see a need for things like grinders with tongue or tzeentch units with the bolt. It's not good enough to only be able to pop a vehicle in hth.

Daemons work. Wave of the future I tell ya. Wait and see.

Yeah deamons have been rough for me to figure out, but I know the potential is there. I have had a number of games where I have massacred people, and a number where i have been massacred. I think I have been trying too many smaller squads. Now its all about two squads of 14 plague bearers as troops and blood crushers with lotsa monstrous creatures and soul grinders.

I wana go rogue and just run an all Slaanesh army.

Hey that would work as the saying goes, rogues do it from behind, fits for the slaneesh. (sorry I had to do it. One of those moments that just cant be passed on)

Seriously, I think an all slanesh army has potential, with a but ton of the elites and fast attack choices. With those you can attempt to hide the turn you drop, then assault 24", as I think they both have fleet right?

You'll get to the assault and be attritioned away. Slaanesh units don't have the knock out first kill abilities of Khorne units or the staying power of Nurgle. They can storm a line, but really need other units coming up in support in order to press home.

They are probably the most random of the gods, as rending has potential to really sway a fight. It usually doesnt and its a bad idea to depend on it, but the potential is there.

Between Fleet and Pavane, they'd have Real nice charge ranges.

Yeah, charge range is nice, but with S3, T3, and a 5+ save, and rending being unreliable at best, daemonettes are best used as something to tie up a unit for a round, keep it from shooting at you while you concentrate on other things. For non-troop choices, the others gods choices are typically much better.

thehod wrote:... The Top builds for deamons seems to be with Bloodcrushers, Deamonzilla, Mixed, All Khorne.

How are people equipping their DPs? Looking at the codex, I thought the only one with potential was the Tzeentch sniper prince with bolt+gaze. Has anyone had success with other builds? Is the sniper prince worth its points?

Centurian99 wrote:

dancingcricket wrote:See above your post concerning land raiders, if you're moving them, you're only getting one shot with PoMS. So I've neutralized half the weapons (at least) anyhow by making you run.

The danger of Land Raiders isn't their weaponry. It's whatever unit they're transporting inside.

Not as much of a danger as you think. First, they have to take a pinning test, unless their fearless. So there's a chance that they wont be able to do anything for a round anyhow. Second, they're no longer zipping across the board to wherever they thought they were going in the first place. Third, it's just one unit now, no longer hiding behind a AV14 wall, so they can really only hurt one unit before they can be attacked the next round, which is essentially all the land raider itself was able to do. Fourth, better to get them out of there somewhat early in most cases, rather have the termies out where I can hurt them on round 3 than on round 5 or 6. Fifth, I've just taken out a land raider with a 80 point unit of screamers. I've taken out a significant chunk of your points in any non-apocalypse battle, which means there's a lot less other things I have to deal with, so I should have plenty to deal with whatever was inside, and weather whatever you try to do to me for the one turn. Sixth, I'd rather have your terminators come out in easy assault range of a 80 point unit of 5 models with 4+ invulnerable saves than an 185 point AV13 model (Or an even more expensive Daemon Prince) that you can shoot up then assault with your thunderhammers, powerfists, etc. And if they leave the unit alone, well, I'm happy to tie them up next round while I move something up than can get in there and ignore the 2+ armor.

185?? you're paying to much for your soul grinders sir!

I'd rather have a unit of lesser daemons surround the target and then have something bigger blow it up

dancingcricket wrote:

AgeOfEgos wrote:

Tortuga932 wrote:umm you do realize screamers are awesome, and seekers can be very good, assault marines are good, everybody used tornadoes until 5th came out, hellhounds are abundant, warpspiders are used, pathfinders in a tau army, grey knight teleport squads, raveners see much use in nids, seraphim for the sisters are widely used. so im confused why you think fast attack doesn't get used?


in the daemon army I actually don't like the heavy support section at all, if ever there was a weak section in that book it's there

Heh heh, screamers are awful guy. Oh, 6s to hit with 1 attack (When they cannot multirole) = fail.

The Heavy is the second best section of the Demon dex...with first being elites. I only call Elites first, as almost every choice there is a good one...with my order being Crushers--Flamers--Fiends--Beasts (Lets play the Sesame Street and see which one of those doesn't belong there..)

Only 6's to hit? A lot of people have that mistaken impression. I'm hitting on 4's, sometimes I don't even need to roll. If my opponent wants to go ahead and run his vehicles around so fast that that he's not getting any effective shooting from them (and only a few vehicles out there can move more than 6 and shoot at all), I'm more than happy to need 6's to hit him. So, run from the screamers and don't shoot, or, don't run, and I'll eat your tank that much sooner. Power of Machine spirit and Fast vehicles are only a slight concern, and since typically you're paying extra for that, I'm ok with it, as it's a larger chunk of your army(point wise) to take out when I do roll the 6. Trust me, with 15 screamers, the 6 comes up, and one hit is quite often all it takes. Additionally I don't care so much if I destroy the tank or not. It's better if it happens, but if not, I'm ok with an immobilize (get to autohit next time), or removing the main gun that's actually a potential worry.

15 Screamers is 240 pts. 240 pts that is only dedicated to tank hunting. For 240 pts, you can have a Soul Grinder + 2 more Crushers....which are good against Nids, Ork Horde + Vehicle light lists. Also;

"So, run from the screamers and don't shoot, or, don't run, and I'll eat your tank that much sooner. Power of Machine spirit and Fast vehicles are only a slight concern..."

Well they are the only argument you could ever make for Screamers, as everything else (barring a Lith) has rear armour 10. So, the only argument for Screamers are Land Raiders and fast vehicles....both of which have a rule that allows extra movement to force 6's to hit (If they are dumb enough to allow you to get close). Put it this way, if the tank is sitting still and isn't a LR or Fast....why do you need screamers?

you need to account for a land raider since the troops can kill any other tank in the game (yes i know not a monolith) and screamers perform that job better than anything else in the codex thats why I run 10 screamers instead of a soul grinder

Tortuga932 wrote:you need to account for a land raider since the troops can kill any other tank in the game (yes i know not a monolith) and screamers perform that job better than anything else in the codex thats why I run 10 screamers instead of a soul grinder

I can see your point. It is very good. But... do you know how many LRs I saw in my games at the GT? Zero.... they aren't as common place as people think.

Tortuga932 wrote:you need to account for a land raider since the troops can kill any other tank in the game (yes i know not a monolith) and screamers perform that job better than anything else in the codex thats why I run 10 screamers instead of a soul grinder

A BT w/ Unholy Might kills AV 14 better than anything in the dex...it can also handle troops. A Soul Grinder can shoot a Str. 10 at range or assault at Str. 10..and can also handle troops (It can, for instance, delay an entire mob of Ork Boyz). Screamers fail to do anything well except blow up Land Raiders that haven't moved. The only time you should purchase Screamers is if you know you are playing a 5 Land Raider force . In an all-comers list, they are wasted points.

You also take screamers if your going up against mech eldar or tau. They can actually keep up with the vehicles, and your BT, SG, DP also need 6's to hit in CC, and those points can be better used doing other things.

and the screamers are much more suvivable than a bloodthirster or soulgrinder 10 screamers need ten wounds to kill them a blood thirster needs 4 and you can see and shoot him from pretty much anywhere (good luck hiding him) and a soulgrinder dies to one shot from any number of weapons, and ten screamers kill land raiders just as dead if they need 6, 4, or hit automatically, since the odds of getting a 6 is much higher with 10 dice instead of 6 (my bloodthirster has whiffed against a tank needing 6's more times than i can count) and if a thirster fails its way more points than if 10 screamers fail. (if you fail what you failed with probably will die) and anytime a screamer needs a 6 guess what does too, thats right anything else assaulting too (that includes a bloodthirster or a soulgrinder) Now if you buy a bloodthirster the str upgrade he does do better against tanks, but it's only 1 better youve instead shifted from needing a 6 to needing a 5 (which is good) but for the same points you get 16 screamers i believe guess who's going to do better against a tank? as far as using a str 10 shot from a grinder?? now you're just wasting points a single shot that only hits half the time?? seems kinda weak to me and as far as holding up ork boyz?? I'd rather take my other units and kill them wholesale

now in my army i use a thirster and screamers since you can't bring just one unit to kill a land raider and expect it to live or your unit to live, and screamers kill tanks way way better than a soulgrinder (once again mobility and survivability and more dice win out over 5 str 10 attacks)

and as far as not seeing land raiders??? at the chicago gt they were everywhere pretty much anyone who could take one did

I was saying I didn't encounter them. They were there but yea... the amount of melta out there I think is finally making people realize land raiders aren't all that good.

Tortuga932 wrote:and the screamers are much more suvivable than a bloodthirster or soulgrinder 10 screamers need ten wounds to kill them a blood thirster needs 4 and you can see and shoot him from pretty much anywhere (good luck hiding him) and a soulgrinder dies to one shot from any number of weapons, and ten screamers kill land raiders just as dead if they need 6, 4, or hit automatically, since the odds of getting a 6 is much higher with 10 dice instead of 6 (my bloodthirster has whiffed against a tank needing 6's more times than i can count) and if a thirster fails its way more points than if 10 screamers fail. (if you fail what you failed with probably will die) and anytime a screamer needs a 6 guess what does too, thats right anything else assaulting too (that includes a bloodthirster or a soulgrinder) Now if you buy a bloodthirster the str upgrade he does do better against tanks, but it's only 1 better youve instead shifted from needing a 6 to needing a 5 (which is good) but for the same points you get 16 screamers i believe guess who's going to do better against a tank? as far as using a str 10 shot from a grinder?? now you're just wasting points a single shot that only hits half the time?? seems kinda weak to me and as far as holding up ork boyz?? I'd rather take my other units and kill them wholesale

now in my army i use a thirster and screamers since you can't bring just one unit to kill a land raider and expect it to live or your unit to live, and screamers kill tanks way way better than a soulgrinder (once again mobility and survivability and more dice win out over 5 str 10 attacks)

and as far as not seeing land raiders??? at the chicago gt they were everywhere pretty much anyone who could take one did

Most of the 40k Demon Lists I've seen/played that are competitve...use 3 Grinders w/ the Str 10 shot. 40kEnthusiast for example posts many battle reports (Which are incredibly good stuff) and he uses this setup. He comes across as a terrific player (and all around good gamer to play against)...so not to use argument from authority...but given my experience I trust his opinion on the matter. The pie plate on the Grinder sounds great until you factor in the need for anti-tank (As the str 8 + 1d6 just doesn't do it). 3 Grinders shooting the Str. 10 AP1 (So +1 on damage) is usually more than enough to blow up a vehicle.

The Grinder could be called the best unit in the dex (PBs, Kairos or Crushers as an argument). You may scoff at holding up 30 Ork Boyz...but playing Orkz with Demons is not a ball of fun. For every Bloodletter you take, they take 3 Boyz. They cover the board making DS more difficult. They overwhelm with 29 wound PKs. They are tough and any unit that can basically negate their #s and allow your Letters to countercharge free of damage...is a great unit!

Screamers won't matter there. Screamers won't matter against anyone that doesn't have a LR....and even then it's up in the air.