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I know it sounds flamebaity, but that's not my intention.

As a bit of context - I'm just returning to WFB after a long hiatus of at least two editions and I'm seeing a lot of people calling Daemons overpowered. Now, I've got a 40K Daemons army that I built with the express intention of making it servicable as a fantasy army, and I would like to field them. But it concerns me the amount of ire they draw and I'd like to avoid certain pitfalls that cause people to lambast them as broken. So, what is it about fantasy Daemons that makes them so broken?

They are far less broken than they used to be under 7th edition mechanics.

Though they still have some annoyingly powerful ones, namely the Masquebomb (Slaanesh list with masque and a slaanesh HQ that can affect things leadership horribly)
While weaker, is still very potent.

I can't remember the other build right now though.

So is it mainly that it was easy to overspecialise in a way that made other armies unable to respond without tailoring?

htj wrote:So is it mainly that it was easy to overspecialise in a way that made other armies unable to respond without tailoring?

You didn't even need to overspecialize, you needed two models at best (a level 4 slaanesh caster, and masque, along with a Great banner of dispair ), that was just it's worst build because it'd likely reduce your entire armies leadership for every single unit down to LD2 without actually being in combat. Not to mention combining it with some of the magic (Phatasmagoria) Which forces you to roll an addition D6 and discard lowest, than hit the stacks with slicing shards or pavane to whittle them down, with items like Allure from slaanesh, where they have to roll to attack your lord and if they fail the LD, the entire unit loses its attacks, siren song to help force your units to charge things you really shouldn't, force characters to hit their units on a LD test (which is around 2-5 now) and if you can't hit their general there's an item that prevents units in B2B from using outside leaderships.


There was another build out there, it was very magically potent and at the same time it was above or near Dark elves level of ability to gain power dice.

And the rest was the entire army was also very powerful in general, with being cheap, causing fear, and other various tricks for cheap.

Wow, OK, that sounds pretty brutal. So I suppose the mitigation you mentioned was the more balanced out magic phase that they've put into 8th, yeah? I shall try to build a list that doesn't play up the more cheesy elements of the army too much, then. After all, it's no fun to play without a challenge.

htj wrote:Wow, OK, that sounds pretty brutal. So I suppose the mitigation you mentioned was the more balanced out magic phase that they've put into 8th, yeah? I shall try to build a list that doesn't play up the more cheesy elements of the army too much, then. After all, it's no fun to play without a challenge.

Along with the fear and terror nerf, as well as some of the charging issues, along with regeneration not being able to stack with ward saves (poor nurgle), and some overall changes.

Generally most people will accept most daemon armies now, except for if you play up a masquebomb list.

Daemons are just upper tier now. They can be beaten, and only the Ld bomb list is truly broken.

Kairos Fateweaver magic spam is also pretty powerful although it took a massive hit with 8th edition(although being able to take any spell you want is still really stupidly powerful)

I used to fanatically play my orcs against a daemon play. He was a sound guy, but his list's brutality was only matched by his arrogance! Seriously, no matter what I tried, masque, nurgle lores, lore of metal etc... Destroyed my hordes so easily with things like final transmutation, breathweapons, that 'entire unit takes a toughness test' nurgle spell. I was beat down so bad from magic that I stood no chance against the 12 flamers and 50 bloodletters, or the 20 daemonettes... It was depressing to watch, still never beat his daemons to this day...

Doesn't mean I don't try tho

In 7th edition, the armybook broke game balance singlehandedly. There were threads on how to not make overpowered lists, which was difficult, as several units were just much too cheap (Tzeentch flamer spam). Seems like they got a bit nerfed in 8th edition, but then again, in this edition one lucky dice roll with high level spells can win over any army list and strategy.

Kroothawk wrote:In 7th edition, the armybook broke game balance singlehandedly. There were threads on how to not make overpowered lists, which was difficult, as several units were just much too cheap (Tzeentch flamer spam). Seems like they got a bit nerfed in 8th edition, but then again, in this edition one lucky dice roll with high level spells can win over any army list and strategy.

Yeah, but so can artillery-one Hellcannon shot from my Chaos Warriors on top of a Grey Seer, Engineer and a unit of Storm Vermin sent them running off the table and crippled the Skaven guy. Whoops

Kroothawk wrote:... but then again, in this edition one lucky dice roll with high level spells can win over any army list and strategy.

You know, the more I play 8th edition the more I find your statement to be untrue. Obviously you're using a little hyperbole there, but can you provide an example where it doesn't matter what you do, and a single uber spell costs you the game?


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timetowaste85 wrote:Yeah, but so can artillery-one Hellcannon shot from my Chaos Warriors on top of a Grey Seer, Engineer and a unit of Storm Vermin sent them running off the table and crippled the Skaven guy. Whoops

Sounds like a lucky shot. Assuming the Storm Banner didn't kick in, and you didn't fail your rampage test, and you didn't misfire, the Skaven player must have failed his leadership at -1 with a re-roll. If he had one rank that would still be Ld 7, so odds are well in his favour. But hey, it's a dice game, and things like this can happen.

It was a team game and he decided not to take the storm banner. Not quite sure why...nobody understood. And he didn't have any ranks-he had the banner bearer, the seer and the engineer left-everything else died from the shot (S5 on a rat will do that). I actually rolled 2 D6 instead of the artillery die but realized it during their turn and did a quick check with an artillery instead-it came up a 6 (I rolled a hit on direction), so it was all good. And he didn't have a re-roll either. We even forgot to take the -1 into consideration. He rolled a 10 for his panic check.

ZebioLizard2 wrote:You didn't even need to overspecialize, you needed two models at best (a level 4 slaanesh caster, and masque, along with a Great banner of dispair )

THAT is massively specialized. There is only 1 lvl 4 slaanesh caster you can get and it's a keeper of secrets. That costs a minimum of 570 points as lvl 4 (with no gifts at all!) + masque 90 + great banner 75 + herald to hold banner 115. So that's 850 pts with no troops whatsoever, just heroes. And it can't even fit in games under 2280pts--and you're most likely going to want to give gifts to the Keeper which can keep him from fitting in games <2600. And you still have a chance of not getting those rough LD spells which you're building your army around.

I think Daemons are fine, if anything they will get buffed in 8th. Some units might get a nerf, but Lords will get cheaper and maybe more flexible. Bloodletters are definately powerful and will likely get a smack. The army has basically 3 go-to units that are really solid, bloodletters, master of sorcery herald, flamers.

But I think people are still having flashbacks to 7th and how crazy they were. Unless you take Khairos or a hell of a lot of Heralds, Daemons are actually not the greatest at magic. They have about the most limited access to lvl 4 casters of any army in the game, because their cheapest lords are still insanely exepensive. They don't have a lot of stuff races like Lizardmen, HE, WoC can do. Though the new 8th armies don't have much of that nonsense anyway.

Agreed. However I have had great success spamming lvl 2 casters. My 2400 tourney list has 4. GUO, lvl 2 horror block and 2 MOS Heralds (life and light)

While daemons don't have a lvl 4 cheaply. I'd rather have the lvl2 loremaster and playing with the cheaper lores light and safest Life than a cheap lvl 4 who has to roll spells.

I have a large toolset available and I know what I have vs every opponent. except the chance that I could roll plague or some other cool nurgle spell. Granted I want the Sig and the other one is dependant on enemy.

timetowaste85 wrote:It was a team game and he decided not to take the storm banner. Not quite sure why...nobody understood. And he didn't have any ranks-he had the banner bearer, the seer and the engineer left-everything else died from the shot (S5 on a rat will do that). I actually rolled 2 D6 instead of the artillery die but realized it during their turn and did a quick check with an artillery instead-it came up a 6 (I rolled a hit on direction), so it was all good. And he didn't have a re-roll either. We even forgot to take the -1 into consideration. He rolled a 10 for his panic check.

Ok, so no Storm banner and no BSB. Can't say I have any sympathy for the Skaven player then.

5+ Ward across the board, they will never flee and panic your other units.

Just two of the smallest reasons they are very powerful.

GalacticZ wrote:5+ Ward across the board, they will never flee and panic your other units.

Just two of the smallest reasons they are very powerful.

They may never flee, but it makes it so much easier to hurt them when you can with Daemonic Instability.

The ward save is meh, as at best it'll only really help them against heavy artillery, and if your using the sword and board formations you'll have a 6++ to help.

Though if you have things that go through ward saves (Wargear, or specific spells), you can have some fun times.

Though I still fear the Tzeentchian spells most of all personally, rather than the troops. ( Glean magic and boon of Tzeentch)

GalacticZ wrote:5+ Ward across the board, they will never flee and panic your other units.

Just two of the smallest reasons they are very powerful.

TK and VC never flee and panic. But they crumble. Just like Daemon instability. It's a blessing and a curse. Stand there and get your face pounded by someone you can't beat and crumble all the while.

And it is literally 5 ward across the board. Meaning that's the best they have other than horrors and SCs. Which isn't to be sneezed at, but the cheapest Daemon is 12 pts, which is about what anyone with 4 armor is going to have. So your cavalry with 1+ armor IMHO is a lot better than a 5+ ward of, say, a Fleshhound.

DukeRustfield wrote:

GalacticZ wrote:5+ Ward across the board, they will never flee and panic your other units.

Just two of the smallest reasons they are very powerful.

TK and VC never flee and panic. But they crumble. Just like Daemon instability. It's a blessing and a curse. Stand there and get your face pounded by someone you can't beat and crumble all the while.

And it is literally 5 ward across the board. Meaning that's the best they have other than horrors and SCs. Which isn't to be sneezed at, but the cheapest Daemon is 12 pts, which is about what anyone with 4 armor is going to have. So your cavalry with 1+ armor IMHO is a lot better than a 5+ ward of, say, a Fleshhound.

Those 12 point daemons you speak of, one of which is a S5, Hatred gaining, killing blow unit, the others are armor piercing, 2 attack units with ASF and likely rerolls, plaguebearers with T4 (okay, least awesome unit, probably the only downgrade from 40k) and the last can gain groups big enough to cast four spells from the lore of Tzeentch.

Grey Templar wrote:Daemons are just upper tier now. They can be beaten, and only the Ld bomb list is truly broken.

Kairos Fateweaver magic spam is also pretty powerful although it took a massive hit with 8th edition(although being able to take any spell you want is still really stupidly powerful)

Agreed... Kairos and company still win most of the events around here, though, and Scooter won the Adepticon Fantasy Big Brawl with a Kairos list just a week and a half ago, with max battle points (one other army also achieved this).

Without Kairos, I think they're Very powerful, but not broken... just wish more events would ban Kairos. Apparently, Adepticon was also going with the GW FAQ and allowing Kairos to choose his spells before each game, rather than before the entire tourney... which makes him really insane in the hands of a player who knows what combinations of spells to take for various match-ups.

Can you tell that I'm not a fan of facing Kairos

ZebioLizard2 wrote:Those 12 point daemons you speak of, one of which is a S5, Hatred gaining, killing blow unit, the others are armor piercing, 2 attack units with ASF and likely rerolls, plaguebearers with T4 (okay, least awesome unit, probably the only downgrade from 40k) and the last can gain groups big enough to cast four spells from the lore of Tzeentch.

Plaguebearers are crap. Bloodletters, if you read this thread, are one of the 3 go-to units in the entire army. No one is crushing tournaments with horror spam or daemonnette spam or plaguebearer spam--yes, there might have been some instance in some game on some planet where it was successful, but they aren't nearly as good as bloods. They'll get a nerf, likely. Even still, it's their KB that really puts them over the top. Start matching them against stuff like core cavalry, ogres, charriots, WoC, cheapo fodder, etc and they're about even-ish. I ran copious mathhammer tests. They only got 3T, so if you get a GW infantry you're in the same realm or something like Saurus Warriors. I think most (good) WoC warrior configurations beat them. Though those aren't 8th.

They have hatred if you add 100+ pts to a unit. Which is about 2 ranks of an enemy.

But again, I'm not saying they are bad by any means. But they aren't quite as godly as people believe. They are fairly similar to Tomb Guard.

Thanks guys, most of what I'm hearing here is encouraging. It sounds like they're still a super tough army but by no means insurmountable. I don't field special characters if I can help it, so my friends won't be cursing Kairos' name any time soon.

They have a lot of good special characters besides him. In fact they might have near the most of any book. They are actually useful and pretty flavorful.

Kind of the alternative is go with the 3 units that everyone uses. Trust me, they will be more pissed off. Daemons have some really good units and some really crappy ones. If 3 units got nerfed, they would be Wood Elves of the chaos lands.

If you bring out Khairos, you're putting 625 points into one guy. You kill that guy and the game is over. He's a monster, so you can't bunker him. He's a large target. He's high risk high reward. It's possible (though not likely) to take him out with 1 cannon shot on the first round. I'm a pretty harsh judge of SCs but I don't think he's broken. He can't fit in any games < 2500 and at that level the enemy is going to have some firepower. And he's not like a combat lord, he's magic. If you roll nothing for the winds of magic or the enemy is mega anti-magic, you're kind of hosed.

At the moment I'm looking at a list comprising of a largeish Bloodletter unit, a similarly sized Daemonette unit, and a medium Horrors unit, with a five strong juggenaut unit, a ten strong Seekers unit, and led by a Bloodthirster. It's more or less me using what I have available in my 40K list for now, but I'd like to slowly convert it into single god forces of around 2000pts.

I try to avoid the over the top use of what's considered prime units. I only take one unit of Letters, I think that Daemonettes match up very well against horde units that need grinding out.

The unable to voluntarily flee eliminates an entire realm of tactics from their toolset as well.

I like bloodcrushers a lot. I think 5 might be much in 1 unit. You can get 3 and still get your rank because they are MC. And they are tough enough that you can have 1 or 2 alone. Also, they are kinda big.

DukeRustfield wrote:I like bloodcrushers a lot. I think 5 might be much in 1 unit. You can get 3 and still get your rank because they are MC. And they are tough enough that you can have 1 or 2 alone. Also, they are kinda big.

Agreed. I love solo fiends as well for the same reasons. My 2400 list has a 2 fiend 1 bloodcrusher rare selection.

Oh, don't forget that Horrors can cast bolt of change at +5 to cast, and can throw 6 dice at it for Irresistible force and a Miscast that only costs them d6 models...and then the Lore of Life Loremaster Herald brings them back.

Yeah, that's not OP.

Let's work this out.

To cast BoC you need a minimum of 26 Horrors + Icon. But you want the full +5 which is 36 Horrors. If they lose 1 guy they are at +4, so let's go to 39 + Herald + Icon. That's 478 pts. Herald + Sorc is 140. So that's 618pts.

And the Herald can miscast. But I guess he'll throne of vines?

So you can cast Throne on 6+, hoping for no dispel/miscast.

And since you idea is to boxcar the bolt you're going to be needing that Regrowth, especially since this is likely one of your main units and it's going to be taking hits.

So your 7+ Bolt of Change is really a 7+ and 9+ Regrowth. What is that, 3-4 dice (you want those boxcars!) and 3-4 dice?

All so you can get 1 cast of 2D6 str D6+4 MAGIC MISSILE that can't be used if this mega block of horrors is engaged in CC or against any target in CC and the various other limitations of MM.

I'm no math wiz, but does not seem like an efficient use of points to me. That's 7 whole points away from affording Kairos Asskicker who can do all this and a lot more.

htj wrote:At the moment I'm looking at a list comprising of a largeish Bloodletter unit, a similarly sized Daemonette unit, and a medium Horrors unit, with a five strong juggenaut unit, a ten strong Seekers unit, and led by a Bloodthirster. It's more or less me using what I have available in my 40K list for now, but I'd like to slowly convert it into single god forces of around 2000pts.

This is very reasonable, and no one should mind playing against it. Heck, no flamers! I'd play against that right now (Flamers are the other thing about daemons that are just insane to me......!)

I have a friend that runs an all-khornate daemons army, and it's fun to play against, looks awesome, and can do extremely well in the right match-ups. Obviously, going pure khornate (as he was) means you'll be susceptible to your opponent getting off spells when he needs them, but a built-in weakness like that can be fun to work around, too.

But as you have it, even not mono-god, it looks like a fun list and I'd be happy to face it! Would still probably roll me, though, but I wouldn't mind . As for special characters, DukeRustfield is right, but I would steer clear of most... the Masque is similarly reviled as Kairos is. Of course, if you're going mono-god taking an appropriate special character would make sense when you get to that point, but I generally steer clear of them when not needed, as well.