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Hey guys, so I'm thinking about building a 1500 point Demon army for a tournament I'm having at the end of the month. Now hear me out, I know this is almost as dumb sounding as spending money on music, but I really think there's gotta be SOMETHING out there that Demon's can use to compete.

Now, why do I want to subject myself to such torture? Well, besides the fact that I think Demons are the coolest things ever, I really think there's has to be something to this idea of taking a bunch of monstrous creatures at a relatively low point level. Not to mention the tactical viability of playing an army that's been sworn off and cast aside so thoroughly that when I was reading the codex last night I found myself thinking, wow, some of these rule are amazing...I've never heard that before.

There must be some tactical viability to blindsiding an opponent with crap they didn't know about, or introducing something so foreign that even veterans aren't quite sure how to mobilize against it.

Now on to the obstacles, I understand that Demons are outcasts for a reason...the Demonic Assault being an even larger crap deal for tournaments then phase out for Necrons was. Not to mention the stupid amount of rules and armies in this game tailored to kick the army while it's already down (Grey Knights, insane amounts of poisoned ranged weapons, etc...). Finally the fact that the army is all but out of print in a lot of cases, or just completely unrealistic to buy (Nurgle Plaguebearers coming a whole 5 to a blister at like 20 bucks a pop for example) will make it hard to build...but I think these obstacles are surmountable...I want there to be yet hope for Demons!!

Which brings me to the reason for this post...if you could do it, how would you build and field a 1500 point Demon list?

Personally, I'm thinking a Greater Demon of some persuasion and 3 pimped out Demon Princes (flying, unholy might, breath of chaos, etc.), filled out with troops (personally I have a special love for Demonette spam but I realize they are probably difficult to use with the whole Demonic assault nonsense).

What are your ideas?

I use Daemons and I've even beat GK at my LGS, now mind you I'm not a good general at ALL. What I did was ask a veteran player and he gave me a few simple rules about daemons most people overlook and makes them a VERY competitive list.

Dualality- Try to have two of everything so if one dies you have another.

Less is more- Daemons are very elite so no need for a lot of upgrades

Flamers> Bloodcrushers- most people disagree but its true one squad of Flamers single handily killed an entire SW shooting line grey fangs and two tanks.

Finally your units all of specific roles- If you cant find a role for a unit (daemonettes nurglings furies) it's going to suck, and suck bad.

Based on these simple principles you can make a REALLY good army

mbombard wrote:... I think Demons are the coolest things ever...

Amen to that! It's always nice to see people who pick an army that appeals to them and reflects their personal tastes rather than going with hyper-competitive cookie cutter armies/ lists that I will refrain from complaining about. Unfortunately I have zero tournament experience with Daemons, I just wanted to commend you for your character . Although I think the general consensus is that Fatecrusher is our only viable competitive build...

Turd Nurgler wrote:

mbombard wrote:... I think Demons are the coolest things ever...

Although I think the general consensus is that Fatecrusher is our only viable competitive build...

No do that's what the MAN wants you to think ,on a serious note once you fall into the fatecrusher rut it's hard to get out, and with the amount of IG recently the close aproximation of your trops will make it easy pickings for mech armies with a lot of blast.

I also love Daemons, its amazing what they can pull off sometimes. my list runs with minimum toughness 5, which is a lifesaver at times. id suggest something along these lines:

HQ

Bloodthirster

TROOPS

10x plaguebearers, icon

^as many of that unit as possible, people wont be able to shift them very easily

HEAVY

Daemon prince
daemonic flight
mark of nurgle
cloud of flies
noxious touch

^ and as many of these as points will allow.

personally I like to fill out my fast attack slots with seekers of slaanesh. they may die to a gentle breeze, but the number of heavy creatures in this list should ensure that the enemies guns will be pointed elsewhere. daemon princes hitting on 3's, wounding on 2's with reroll + 18 inch threat range is not something a competant general will ignore. allowing the seekers to quietly move to some obscure location on the board and assault weak points in the enemy army. bloodthirster is self explanatory

Go for khorne, bloodletters have furious charge so they are then str and initiative 5 like in fantasy but with 3 atks each not just 1 and they also have power weapons so they'll cut through any large unit e.g. Orc boyz

Turd Nurgler wrote:

mbombard wrote:... I think Demons are the coolest things ever...

Amen to that! It's always nice to see people who pick an army that appeals to them and reflects their personal tastes rather than going with hyper-competitive cookie cutter armies/ lists that I will refrain from complaining about. Unfortunately I have zero tournament experience with Daemons, I just wanted to commend you for your character . Although I think the general consensus is that Fatecrusher is our only viable competitive build...

I appreciate that! I'm pretty excited to do this, it's amazing what they can do...it's kind of a mystery to me why they are ignored to such an extreme. I mean like I said earlier, Demonic Assault is a big minus but other than that they have some pretty incredible rules, paired with nobody knowing what demons can do, I know I can be effective...given the blessings of my new gods!!!

I am your humble servant, as an extension of your will, let me destroy, maim, and crush everything..amen!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Arehian wrote:Go for khorne, bloodletters have furious charge so they are then str and initiative 5 like in fantasy but with 3 atks each not just 1 and they also have power weapons so they'll cut through any large unit e.g. Orc boyz

thanks for the advice...last weekend I took the dive and did it, I am now officially a servant of the dark gods. here is what i'm thinking will be my army composition (i.e. what i worked out on paper, researched, and built)...what do you think? any tweaks i should do?

HQ
-Bloodthirster "Skratch" (possibly my new favorite model and unit in the entire game!)

TROOPS
10 Bloodletters
-Icon
-Fury
-Instrument

10 Bloodletters
-Icon
-Fury
-Instrument

10 Pink Horrors
-Bolt
-Icon
-Instrument

10 Pink Horrors
-Bolt
-Icon
-Instrument
-Changling

Demon Prince
-Flight
-Iron Hide
-Mark of Khorne
-Blessing of Khorne
-Unholy Might
-Fury

Demon Prince
-Iron Hide
-Mark of Tzeentch
-Master of Sorcery
-Bolt of Tzeentch
-Gaze
-BoC

My tactics would be to pick the Tzeentch units (PH and Tzeentch DP) to come in first and lay down some fire (originally I had 3 flamers but I replaced them with another unit of bloodletters). This will allow me (I think) to be effective in turn one, soften up some units, and give me an excuse to stay on my side of the board where it should be safer to deepstrike. After that my Khorne units will come in on the icons, my horrors priortizing fire on things within threat range of the khorne units hopefully allowing me to control assaults in the next turns.

I have played Daemons allot and won allot with them, Now they have aged poorly and the newer codexs give you a very hard fight but bring big small number of units and yes fate crusher is still king. I have a set of 24 blood crushes and have made every one around here respect the blood crushers for there toughness.

Flamers> Bloodcrushers- most people disagree but its true one squad of Flamers single handily killed an entire SW shooting line grey fangs and two tanks.

man, I want your dice. Mine die after 1 good round of flaming. Usually can fry the long fangs from breath but how'd you burn down 2 tanks with them too? survived 3 turns and got to bolt things?

Anyways, I am currently building at 1500:

Fateweaver - 333
Heralds of tzeentch in chariot with "we are legion" + mastery of sorc + bolt - 110 x 2 units = 220

Fiends x6 + unholy might = 190

Bloodcrushers x6 + instrument + icon + fury = 280 (2 total units = 560)


plaguebearer x5 = 75 (2 squads = 150 )

Total of 1453

I'm stuck at the part where I decide the following:

Throw in more plaguebearer bodies in the 2 squads?
Drop the 2 heralds and take a skulltaker on juggernaut?
Take a daemon prince instead of the 2 heralds?
swap the plaguebearer for a horror squad with changeling?
swap in a lord of change instead of the heralds for better save?

Honestly I'm going to proxy in some stuff till I like what I see with it but that's just my core units. Few model count so its easier to paint but my $!@#@!% are bloodcrushers pricy. 50 bucks for box of 3!? I'm just glad I love the model. Still cheaper than me planning to use the chaos lord on juggernaut as my skulltaker in higher point games though...

I run a shooting heavy daemons army and it throws people for a loop because they generally don't expect that amount of firepower.

Important units:
Herald of T: chariot, bolt, Master of sorcery, we are legion.
This melts marines and pops tanks all at the same time. Probably the best unit for its points in the whole codex.

Horrors: 5 guys, one bolt.
Cheap and effective troops. The BS 3 is annoying but they throw out enough shots to get something done, and the 4++ means I regularly have the last guy for the squad survive several rounds of shooting.

Daemon Princes: MoT, bolt, Daemonic gaze.
No need for wings or IH with the MoT. This an inexpensive prince that can really dish out the hurt at range. With BS 5 he will do just as much damage at range as he does in CC.

Aside from shooting I usually run 2-3 units of strong cc (Bloodthirster, Fiends, Bloodcrusher) to either absorb charges or to be threatening enough that the enemy must shoot them instead of all of my ranged.

Never run more than 2 icons, it simply isn't necessary and they are expensive.

I don't run instruments on anything but PB's (and sometimes crushers). The chances of tying combat is so slim that even 5 points is a waste. PB's on the other hand have a decent chance of tying combat since they don't dish out much damage and they tend not to die.

Fury of Khorne is not really necessary on anything, most everything already ignores saves so the only benefit is armor penetration. YMMV

ThatEdGuy wrote:
I don't run instruments on anything but PB's (and sometimes crushers). The chances of tying combat is so slim that even 5 points is a waste. PB's on the other hand have a decent chance of tying combat since they don't dish out much damage and they tend not to die.

I figured icons were important to have on everything (even worth sacrificing the points) just because it's not guaranteed what will come in and then it's not guaranteed what will survive to bring your other units down. I may look at cutting a few out for things that aren't important, hopefully 10 horrors is enough to survive one round on their own so maybe I won't get two...but then again if one unit mishaps, I'll want the other one to do be able to be the "backup" anchor. What a conundrum!

Now on to the quoted part. I'm running Tzeentch/Khorne for a couple reasons, the primary reason being that Plaguebeares (probably my preferred CC half) are so expensive...I'd want a bunch and it's like 15 bucks for a couple of them. So my second choice is Khorne...I feel like the organization seems to be that you NEED Tzeentch, and then the other three you can swap out to a certain extent. Which brings me to the other reason I picked khorne over the others...power weapons. The meta seems to be going towards things that are stupidly hard to kill and having a bunch of them. I think I'll be okay, at least on even footing against armies not designed to fight me. Against Grey Knights and Dark Eldar (who out range me and largely ignore my T value) I feel like I'll need those hellblades to win combats quickly. I feel like PBs are better at gumming things up and Deamonettes are more specialized towards specific units like lower toughness/ lower Armor units like gun line infantry. I need to be able to assess threats, choose targets, crash into them and get the work done quickly so I can move on to the next pocket of crap shooting at me. It seems like my game is speed in combat, and taking down targets and moving on before the enemy has too many turns to whittle my DPs and BT down. PBs and 'Nettes don't seem to cut it for me at this point level.

At least this is what I'm thinking...I've yet to have my first game with them though so it's all paperhammer right now.

At higher points I'm thinking about getting some Demonettes and Slaanesh cav for the speed, to use as more of a scalpel unit to go deal with gun lines and fast units, and PBs to sit on points. I think this will allow me in larger games to tie up combats until my BTs get around to finishing them off, or in the PBs case, to take and hold points, and not having it matter too much if they dally around in a combat because I'll have more tools to deal with helping complete the fight when I want it to be completed.

bloodletters against decent opponents means that they will likely spread out and blood letters turn into mostly one shot units in that you likely will chop down whoever you DS close enough but they are a very slow troop choice so you won't reach too many other guys. I would not expect any one squad of blood letters to really get to more than 1-2 at most targets before spending alot of time running, and or getting shot to death. Now if you had enough of these guys covering alot more of the field, you could potentially herd your enemies into other groups. Horrors are good at shooting no doubt but I've lost melee even to necrons so they don't hold very well. That T3 really hurts

That's true, they aren't really that fast. At 1500 do you think it'll be critical to have a speed unit? I'm thinking Seekers if anything.

I think in today's heavy mech and shooty meta (at least my area anyway) I almost always need at least some synergy with tying up some folks and getting the rest to pile in to actually finish them off. Seekers are not an absolute must as I perfer fiends for high chance to wreck tanks but they definately have their uses for charging units in cover due to being one of the only units with grenades.

Remember that if you charge a unit already engaged in combat even if they charge through terrain, they will still strike a normal initiative. I'd really try playing something as sub in's like seekers to see if you like them.

Mono Tzeentch is quite effective against MEQ and light mech.

@ 1500 points

Fateweaver
Tzeentch Herald

x3 Flamers
x3 Flamers
x3 Flamers

x5 Pink Horrors + Bolt
x5 Pink Horrors + Bolt
x5 Pink Horrors + Bolt

Daemon Prince + Bolt + Gaze
Daemon Prince + Bolt + Gaze
Daemon Prince + Bolt + Gaze

Running all Tzeentch? Interesting thought, isn't it taboo to run demons with only one persuasion? How would this list handle assault lists?

the same way gunline armies deal with assault, run away and keep shooting.

The good and bad parts are that your shooty units are usually quite mobile like flamers are jetpacks and fateweaver can use daemonic flight. The bad news is that you often don't buy the points for wings with tzeentch princes cause the costs start getting prohibiitive and you are trying to do too much with one model. Also alot of the best daemon shooting is in the form of templates so you end up too close to the opponent. Vs assaulty things like BA, it can be pretty hard to win as monotzeentch has very weak troops. You can probably tarpit some dudes with the princes and fatweaver making a giant firing block though. But if they wipe your troops, you are then just looking at a draw or you'd have to table to win.

Personally I'd use 2 tzeentch heralds and drop one prince from the above mono list. The flamers would end up being suicide units though often can make up their points. The heralds on charriots can keep up with fateweaver due to their jetbike status.

I want to try this, my goal was eventually to field fateweaver in some way anyway, but I figured like the Sanguinor he's mostly better in higher level games. I imagine him with a phalanx of assault demons would be pretty awesome because of the re-roll save rule.

I definitely love flamers, like I said before, I REALLY wanted to field them but again, I figured (at 35 points a model) they were a bit expensive at 1500 points, and without them I could field about a million more bloodletters.

To me they seem like too much of a risk to deepstrike within template range, but ineffective if dropping too far away...Str 5 Ap3 is good but they won't be earning their points back very quickly by killing some tac marines off in the distance...

Definitely something I'll want to try though, I'm sure I'm probably wrong about them lol.

I usually deepstrike my flamers in the non prefered wave as close as possible for maximum damage, sure you will misshap sometimes, this is why i recomend 3 cheap squads but its well worth it.
OFC if there are no good targets then deepstrike out of LOS.
I find a lot of people underestimate how fast a flamer can move and forget they are jump infantry.

Thanks for the advice Lepuke, I think I'm going to pick up a couple units of these...I wanted to at first but I went for more Bloodletters.