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I recently traded my IG army for a Daemon army and I frankly have no idea how to play them, I've just always loved the Daemon models. This is what I have model wise NOT AN ARMY LIST...

HQ - Keeper of Secrets, Great Unclean One, Bloodthirster, Lord of Change, The Masque

Elites - 5x Flamers

Troops - 19x Bloodletters, 20x Plaguebearers, 17x Daemonettes, 33x Horrors, 3x Nurglings

Fast Attack - 5x Flesh Hounds, 5x Seekers

I'm already more than aware that Daemons are not considered a very good army in 40k but that doesn't really mean anything to me, I just want to know how to play them effectively based on what I have for a .5k,1k, and 2k game plus what I should get next.

Alright now I have 9 more Nurglings, 4 beasts of nurgle, a daemon prince, and some heralds in the making.

Ok, well next you should look to picking up some Elites. either Bloodcrushers OR Fiends. They are both extreemly 'killy' but its a matter of preference.

I assume you have the codex?

Probably the best way to go would be to proxy Lord of Change as Fateweaver and run Bloodthirster with some elites at 1500 points.

The Blood Letters, Blood Thirsters, and Blood Crushers all look good together on the table. And seam to be a popular choice. When I run Daemons I will run those three with some Slaanesh on the side.

Zambro wrote:Probably the best way to go would be to proxy Lord of Change as Fateweaver and run Bloodthirster with some elites at 1500 points.

This is the best way to learn. Fateweaver and a Bloodthirster pack a nasty 1-2 punch. Granted, you are paying a premium in points for it, but it hits like a brick.

A popular build is fateweaver with 2 units of blood crushers. Again, a very nice list to start out with. However, my preference would be to run a Fateweaver + Fiends list. But, fiends being $22 a model puts the brakes on that really quick.

You will get a ton of advice to run plague bearers as troops. I am not a fan of it, but I do acknowledge and understand that rationale behind it. If you run bloodletters, run in groups of 5 or 15. 10 is that point where you scare people to shoot them to death before they reach you and you waste a ton of points. They are very fragile and vulnerable to shooting. They don't move very fast, so be careful.

I love flesh hounds in theory, but it has been my experience they really don't do much. Maybe you can find a way to use them properly.

Based on what you have, I would run something like:

Lord of Change (as fateweaver)
Bloodthirster or Keeper of Secret (with Unholy Might)
Flamers
Seekers

Troop choice is your call. You can make an argument for daemonettes, bloodletters, horrors, or plague bearers.

Lastly, the daemon prince you have give him Mark of Tzeentch, Bolt, and Gaze. Use as a firing platform.

The base of your army above will be very fast. Your HQs, Elites, and seekers can close rapidly. This will help negate some of the daemon's weaknesses.

Overall, just try out different units and see what you like. Have fun. Daemons are a great army to run and are tougher than you give them credit.

Welcome to the Warp.

okay well i have had amazing results with masque..she always gets into cc and ties up the toughest of units for a while which is great...i dunno i have had great success with her.

the other good thing with masque is that you can use her with the flamers. use her pavane to group units together into tight blocks then drop your flamers (well you try to deep strike your flamers into a decent position before then pavane other units into place) and just drop those templates and vaporise everything there.

flesh hounds are fantastic and are okay in a group of 5...seekers really need to be at 10 tho, they always seem to die for me, but both are good options and i would run them both.. Place them either in first wave or just out of range of fire then run then in and try to avoid getting shot to bits.

with troups...2 lots of 5xhorrors and then maybe a block f 16 daemonettes to sheild your seekers and 2 lots of 7 plagues for objectives holding.

as for the other hq ideas and demon princes the above posts cover it perfectly...and actually cover most in good order, i just thought i would put my little spin on things.

I only have one problem with the Masque. She is not an IC and cannot join a squad. Hence, she lasts maybe 2 turns before being shot to death. If they were to fix that one thing, I would seriously consider running her with a squad of daemonettes.

Until then, I have to pass on her. Mainly because I run Fateweaver and a Bloodthirster (may eventually change to a KoS)

Flesh hounds are nice in that they have a 24" threat range. You can use to tie up units until the bulk of your army reaches. It may work well with everything you have. It would keep the speed of this army up which would be scary fast. The same is true of your seekers.

does anyone actually play demons and not notice the mistake he made?!?!

you cannot have 2 monstrous creature hq either 4 non monster hq or 1 monster and 2 little but you get the idea

i would recommend as a fellow daemon player have your units go in 1-2 because that's what i always roll

have keeper of secrets and bloodthruster as skarbad this is a deadly combo and when skarbad charges he has ST 9. 9!!!

flamers are basically your 1 trick shot they come in either flaming squads and tanks (glances on 4+) or they shoot their 3 ap 4 s 4 shot

blood letters are the best melee troops pretty much that i can think of right now ( not including gk) if these guys do not get focused on they will rip appart the squad and walk out with 0 casualty their weakness is shooting they will die by the thousands abuse cover

pleague bearers are either A your hey shoot me i can bring in more units with my icon or B objective holders or C people that can somewhat be threatinning?? pleage is kind of useless unless you have epidermus but they cant really kill anything

daemonettes are the fastest and the weakest of the bunch they will get in attack first and may or may not kill the enamy and may or may not survive the attack back but they are fast

you cannot have 33 horrors in 1 squad but what they do is that they drop in go WAS UP and shoot them with ALL of their shots if 20 in 1 squad they will shot 60 shots at them witch they will most likely not to survive but that's 1 squad there is probably more and you will die the next turn

flesh hounds and seekers are basically the same diffrece is seekers are faster and go first and hounds are stronger and will probably kill it

what i recommend getting is blood crushers, princes , fiends, and some more of the fast attack

NEVER EVER EVER EVER EVER EVER EVER use nurglings or beast of nurgle they are the worst units IN THE GAME!!!!!!!!

jbsnv wrote:does anyone actually play demons and not notice the mistake he made?!?!

you cannot have 2 monstrous creature hq either 4 non monster hq or 1 monster and 2 little but you get the idea

What are you talking about? Please reference a page number in the codex where it says you cannot do this.

As for skarbrand, I have yet to try, but my preference is for a bloodthirster with unholy might. Same strength and has flight. Skarbrand has fleet, but that limits your movement.

I don't think he was saying he would take 33 horrors. That was just the number of models he has.

jbsnv also brings a valid point about flamers. Most players will focus on them until they are dead as they are quite killy. Be cautious with them and be prepared for them to be shot to bits.

page 80 at the top

What I listed isn't an army list, its what I have.

Does someone have the codex handy?
I would like to know what page 80 says that I have been missing all this time.

Page 80 is all the unique daemonic heralds.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Btw the nurglings and beast of nurgle are for fantasy mostly but I could use them in 40k.

You can have 2 MC as your hq i got the codex and its quite plain. Also their quite a few lists with Fateweaver/Bloodthrister HQ's incl some tournement lists which im sure are correct.

Anyway, just thought id add that

That is good to hear. I will check the codex when I get home, but I never recall reading anything to that effect.

4 heralds of khorne on Juggernaut rideing off into the sunset with a trail of blood fallowing them where ever they went

All it is (on pg 80) is that you cannot have 2 of the same named heralds. so you can't have masque and masque or anything stupid like that. but you can have masque and epidemious for instance, or even masque and 1 or 2 heralds if you want. The rule is that if your taking heralds, then you can have 2 heralds for 1 HQ organization slot...and since you have 2 slots you can take 4, i have seen people do this alot with tzeentch heralds. (masque is just as an example...she is my example for everything lol)

i really like the fate-brand combo lol, it's not ultra effective for me as i havn't built my army around it properly but it's a lot of fun. i recommend giving it a try as it sound slike your playing for fun anyway, and your opponents will love hate you too lol, since eeeveryone reroll to hit.

nurglings are a good tar pit, but you have to expect that you will give away kp when you use them. probably best to deepstrike them aggressively nd lock something into combat, but they will die and not do anything other then stall your opponent, might be a nice idea to have them run ahead of your fast attack like a barrier (not los but just to tie things up till you get there)

masque is very ymmv, i always get her locked into combat by turn 2/3 if she is still alive and try to pull off my flamer kapow before then if lucky. i think maybe we have a love affair or something, because she always survives for me till turn 4/5. so since she loves me i will keep taking her nd using her as a tactical drop and tarpit...but if you have a KoS he would probably be much better.

i don't think you need to get more stuff, you got lots of the good basics already and enough for a good fun 1200pt list i think. you can obviously do more pts but then you might start to find it hard to take on your opponents is all. very solid WHFB as well, lots of troops and a strong fast attack with good hq choices and that will be plenty for fantasy in the smaller points ranges.

another idea that popped into my head was a full on nurgle list with a counts as epidemious herald, GUO, your plague bearers beasts of nurgle and nurgling basses...i think that would be fun to play, again deploying super aggressively lol

let us know of how your games go nd what list you end up making. i think you have alot of flexibility here.

Since ive got time to burn, ill do a rough rundown.

HQ:

Fateweaver: The re-rolls to saves is the main reason for taking him.
Keep him center of the army to keep your units going and use him as a firing platform as he has pretty much every weapon based gift.
Try to keep him out of combat though as he isnt all that amazing when he gets flooded.
Simply keep a unit near by to deny any assaults on him.

Ku'gath: Not a commonly used character as he is very slow, but he is also one of the hardest to kill.
Main reason to take him would be for an epidemius tally list, in which his missile does pretty decent damage.
Other than that though, he is very slow and sluggish, so not great overall.

Skarbrand: A thirster with might an extra attack + breath of chaos.
Also has fleet instead of wings.
So, hard as nails, but his special rule is a real double edged sword.
Against less combat orientated armies its great, but against orks and anything that can swing a weapon you can pretty much kill yourself, more so if its against dark eldar or the likes as they will usually be striking 1st.

Bloodthirsters: A walking battle tank in no short terms.
Throw might on them if you want to make sure you can get the best out of them in tank hunting.
Might also be worth taking the increased inv. save against psychic attacks.

Keeper of secrets: A slightly tamed down version of a thirster, but more attacks at a higher initiative.

Lord of change: Better save than the other greater daemons and usually act as a firing platform.
However, they stack up on points pretty quickly so your best off going with a daemon prince to do the same job.

Great unclean one: Not much use really.
Slow, doesent hit all that hard, no really "stand out" upgrades for it.

Skulltaker: Worth every single point due to his 4+ rend and instant death.
Either walk him with a unit of bloodletters or throw him on a jugger and put him in a unit of crushers for a pretty nasty unit.
The chariot is a waste though as it stops him joining units and he gets killed very quickly.

The masque: She cant join units, but does have a 3++ and the ability to throw enemy units around 3 times a turn, so she has some use.
She usually gets shot to pieces early on though, so her uses are limited and depend on your play style.

Epidemius: Slow, sluggish in combat and only has a use in a tally list where you will be going all out with nurgle daemons.
Outside of a tally list, useless.

Heralds:
Khorne; Good on a jugger for boosting the strength of crusher units, give him might and rending and he can hunt armour at the same time.
Like skulltaker, the chariot gets him killed rather than helping.

Slaanesh; Alot of attacks, give her might to get her strength up enough to hurt something.
Steed is ok, but chariot makes her last alot longer and unlike khorne chariots, she can still join a unit of seekers.

Nurgle: There really is a pattern here.
They really dont have much use unless you want to add some defence to a unit of plaguebearers on an objective.
Then you simply give him breath to help thin any units that get too close.

Tzeentch: Bolt, chariot, keep him moving and hunting armour.
Out of the heralds, this is one of the most commonly taken ones as daemons struggle a bit with armour.



Elite:

Beasts of nurgle: Remember that pattern that had emerged earlier? its back.
Slow, weak in combat, not worth taking.

Flamers of tzeentch: Normal thing for them is to work as a suicide unit.
Simly use a unit that has an icon to deepstrike them where you need them and open fire.
Dont worry about taking bolt, they wont really live long enough to use it.
The main use is to fry high priority targets like paladins and other termies.

Crushers: Slow, but hit like a ton of bricks.
The icon is a nice option as it provides a stable platform for dropping in units by them.
Instrument isnt really essential, but its cheap and helps you bounce wounds through the unit and last a bit longer.
All in all, a very solid unit, more so when fateweaver is boosting saves for them.

Seekers: They are like crushers, but die alot easier.
They are however stupidly quick, have a ton of attacks and are very useful for grinding through units and tanks.
Again, like crushers, a solid unit.



Troops:

Horrors: The shooting option out of the troops.
Able to lay down a ton of fire, have a better save but are utterly useless in combat.
Still a nice choice though.

Plaguebearers: Mainly used for sitting on objectives since FNP and high toughness keeps them going for longer.
Dont expect anything else from them though.

Daemonettes: Fast, a ton of rending attacks but very fragile.
Great for unarmoured units like orks (in smaller units) and guard, but if you dont wipe the unit out, you will take heavy losses.
Also good against small armoured units due to rending, but not 100% as rending is very iffy.

Bloodletters: Hard hitting and have power weapons as standard.
Your basic power armoured killing unit in the army.
Good strong choice, but unit size depends on play style.

Nurglings: That pattern is back, need i go on?



Fast attack:

Furies: Like the nurgle choices, they are hopeless.

Flesh hounds: Fast, pretty hard hitting but lack any ability to hunt either tanks or armoured units.
These really are down to a players preferance, but i really do dislike them.
Plenty of other units can do what they do, but better.

Seekers: Like daemonettes, but faster and with more attacks to boot.
Good choice and a great unit for helping in combats due to the speed they can get from different points of the board.

Screamers: I like them.
They move like jetbikes and have melta bombs, so anti-armour is their only real role in the army.
They will usually get shot pretty quickly though, so if you plan on taking them, take 2 units of 6 to get the job done.



Heavy:

Soulgrinder: The only thing in the daemons list with an armour value, so it attracts each and every lascannon, melta and missile in the game.
It does however act as a nasty firebase.
Phlegm is the most commonly used upgrade as the template causes plenty of damage.
Tongue is nice when you read it, but misses most of the time, so your better off with the above.

Daemon princes:

Shooting princes; Mark of tzeentch, bolt, gaze, breath, take your pick here.
Usually wings is a common upgrade along with iron hide, but they start building up in points very quickly.
But for cheapness, mark of tzeentch, wings and bolt will do if your on a tight budget.

Combat: Mark of khorne, unholy might, wings and iron hide will keep them going.
Plenty of speed and hitting power, so tanks and armoured targets are both fair game.
Keep away from large units though as the prince can only kill so much, he will end up getting tied in combat and brought down through weight of attacks.
Another popular build is the same as the last, but mark of nurgle instead.
The extra toughness keeps him going alot longer at the cost of an extra attack.
More than worth it.





I know its a wall of text, but hope it helped out to some degree

Most of this is okay but there are three glaring points that are inaccurate.

Tongue - This is as good/better than a Bolt prince for wrecking armor. If you think a DP with Bolt is good anti-armor you cannot think a SG with tongue is poor anti armor without contradicting yourself.

Slaanesh Chariots - These are not IC's so you cannot join them to a unit of seekers.

Daemonettes - These excel at killing Monstrous Creatures and expensive units with a poor or no invulnerable save. Their s3 is not good for putting down a lot of wounds on hordes. They are bad against Ork Boyz especially.

Except when im using a grinder i prefer to fire its pie plate, rather than missing every other turn with tongue.

Also, princes advance and bolt, and then if needed, combat.
Grinders need to keep away from combat as the odd hidden fist or klaw, or even being in melta range will end them.

Ill have to check that one -_-
Was sure it only changed the type from infantry to cav rather than removing IC.

Nettes: Read what i wrote.
"Smaller units of orks" so things like lootas or kommando's.
Running into a unit of 30 boys is plain and simple suicide.
So you rely on killing a MC or character through a huge succession of 6's?
Thats not really a reliable way of doing it.
On average your going to be hitting on 4+ so you lose half of the attacks as missed.
Depending on unit size, you will only really get 3-4 6's at the most on normal roll's.
Also, the retaliation from a MC is not a good thing for nettes, more so when you think T3 and 5++

i gotta say i agree with both of you on the daemonette issue.

i have taken out tanks with a luck couple of 6's but then my unit is 14-16 daemonettes...and they are treated as a total suicide unit.

in fact thats the flavour of my whole daemon army, suicide units going in for the bang and leaving behind only a couple of crushes and maybe some letters a group of horrors if they survive and in more games then not i still have a hound or 2 left on board. so everything else goes in for a suicide and wrecks the day. This actually works quite well, you have to keep track of kill points and where your objectives are, if you can do that then you can math hammer a suicide plan and win by the skin of your teeth. btu thats just me.

still everyones putting down some great run downs and play experiances for daemons, i'm really enjoying this thread lol

A MC usually wounds anything on a 2+ so who cares if you are T3 or 4? The downside is most of them do not have that many attacks - a DP has 4, a Trygon has 6 (better but still not enough to knock down 12 - 18 Daemonettes).

I would gladly rely on 6's to rend out MC's (Trygon, Tervignon, Daemon Princes), Necron Lords w/o Phase Shifters, et cetera. Why? Because with 48 attacks you can throw down 4 Rends at I6 and there is A LOT of upside luck potential there. The odds of them wiping those Daemonettes is pretty poor (6 attacks at WS 5 rerolling hits - on say a trygon - nets you about 3 unsaved wounds. I will take that trade any day of the week while I finish rending it out the next turn).

Phlegm only does what all Daemons do well - kill infantry. With all the cover laying about reducing that 3+ to a 4+ is not that impressive. I am not sure why you are afraid of a power fist that has a 1/18 chance to wreck it per hit. A Daemon Prince folds much more easily to the units combined pistols and charges - especially a Tzeetch prince.

I agree you need to manage Meltas with a grinder - but if a unit wants to move up 12", hope out of their transports and take a melta shot at my grinder I am totally cool with it. That unit just started the multi-charge parade I plan to hold to celebrate my impending victory.

Edit: Even against small units of boyz they are underwhelming due to S3. Also, I want to add that seekers are phenomenal - they have a flexible DS footprint so they almost always end up where you want them, have a huge threat range and are the glue that hold multi charges together. Further, the other Elite are Fiends who absolutely murder Power Armor and T3 models by forcing a ton of saves - 5 base attacks at S5.

As for Skar - it is not a huge disadvantage that your opponents get his reroll as well. He doubles the number of hits against cruising vehicles to tear them apart and you are so much more killy in combat, he lets you make even more aggressive charges than before and is a beast in and of himself.

True, but unless your running maxed units or have great luck, its going to go onto a 2nd round of combat, in which case the MC has struck back and you would have more than likely taken yet more wounds for losing the assault.

Nettes need to be quick.
simply rush into a combat, kill the unit/model, start towards another unit.
Drawn out combats are not something they excel at as they cant take any form of return attacks.

Also, keep in mind that 99% of other armies use ranged weapons.
I doubt a unit of daemonettes will make it into combat at full strength unless someone has no idea what they can do.
And also, your a sitting duck when they arrive, which is the turn they will take the most damage.

Trygon and tervy? fair point.
Daemon princes or anything with the same size base or smaller, how will you get every model into combat?
And if you have got to a model like that, you wont have 48 attacks, the unit is likely to be at half strength if your lucky.

1/18 is pretty good for the grinder, but what good is he with missing weapons or immobilised?
You dont have to wreck a walker to make it useless.
And thats a klaw, now re-work it with a S9 klaw that will be throwing 4 attacks at it.

The pie plate i find is just far more reliable in my own games.
While tongue is amazing, the fact its hitting every other turn is not.
however, with dual grinders you will be getting a hit each turn.

I take the prince for his mobility and the fact he can gain cover in most places, unlike the grinder.
I also have the assurance that a stray melta or las shot wont kill him. (4++ against it anyway, so only a 50/50 of it wounding)



True, but thats assuming you have a unit on hand and ready to use.
Daemons dont really bring large swarms to the table, so most units are engaged in combat or hiding to keep them alive.
Also, i rather not sacrifice a grinder to simply get a unit out of a transport.



On a quick note, ive played a fair few podmarines armies.
This is mainly why i prefer princes.
Average build allways includes combi-melta sternguard, which have a dead certain chance to ruin armour.
If you have a grinder, that will be the most logical target, so guess where that pods going?

Doesent matter if you kill them the next turn, they have lived up to the role of a suicide unit and have killed something you use for armour hunting.



Again though, i think these are more of our own views as we seem to play very differently, so again, its down to play style for army structure and choices.






Edit for your edit: Ill agree on seekers, ive started running 2 units simply as a trial and they have done nothing but amaze me.
Even if i dropped one of my units of screamers to take them.

Skar - Read what i wrote
Was more aimed against high initiative armies like dark eldar who will actually strike 1st.
However, if you want to make the best use of him, run a slaanesh horde with him and watch the tears roll down an opponants face.
I find letters are far too often having to go 2nd in combat, so dont like the idea of losing more models before i can attack.

Keep in mind aswell, 30 mobz of boys have just become a whole lot more deadly.
There is nothing in the daemons dex that will wipe them out in a single turn of combat, so you need to (in theory) shoot them enough to make it an easy charge.
Which is where phlegm comes in.
Cover saves are nice, but when your taking 12 or so at a time? not so much.

Phlegm on another note is also good for nob bikers and paladins.

You know this has been pottering around in my brain.

Skarband and his re-rolls isnt he "particularily" good against GK cause they would normally re-roll against daemons anyway?

So it just makes Daemons vs GK a normaler match.

You can definitely get 12 bases into CC against a MC base - you only need to be within 2" of an engaged mode - if you can get 10 marines out of a side access point, you can get 12 Daemonettes in b2b with a MC.

Also, I would rather go to another round of combat - I want to stay in during their shooting phase.

BS 3 on Tongue is largely irrelevant since it is 4+/2+ on a rhino for a grinder and 2+/4+ for a prince (i.e. the same odds). Further, a Klaw is only S9 on the charge. I look at the grinder as an option to pin that mob down for another assault - a Prince loses that particular battle every time anyway. At least the other 29 boyz cant hurt the grinder.

In general the key to taking down those large boys mobs is fearless wounds and I have found a few chained assaults can take them down in a single assault phase.

yeah it's deffinatelly down to your play style and the opponents around you for how you play and construct your daemons.

i am also not a fan of the hit and run on daemonettes and things, because i have not been able to totally erradicate a unit then run to the next, what happenes is i hit a unit and when i run to the next they get shot at ... so even tho they will loose in cc for another round, they tie up my opponent instead of just running away and getting killed, they become tarpit effective.

but then i guess it's how you build your list and how you play it, you can always spam it up a bi tto make sure you can run in kill a unit then run to the next andn not get wiped. i just don't play that way lol

in my mind, i'm going into a game to die...i'm just going to try to take everything with me as i go lol i try to tacktically calculate a win based on a single thing left on the table lol or just having a single objective and contesting the rest. its not the smartest play but its alot of fun when it works

personaly i think daemons is all down to luck

jbsnv wrote:personaly i think daemons is all down to luck

*facepalm* They require a more flexible approach and you can have your dice abandon you (just like any other army) but this is patently not true.

calypso2ts wrote:

jbsnv wrote:personaly i think daemons is all down to luck

*facepalm* They require a more flexible approach and you can have your dice abandon you (just like any other army) but this is patently not true.

+1 to Calypso. While luck is definitely a factor, daemons are a skill and finesse army. I think Daemons are one of the armies that really require you to tailor your army to your playstyle. You can read the internets all you want, but how you play really determines what you should bring to the table.

Now, if the rumors of 6th ed are true, the daemons codex may be getting a significant change to their playability. The last rumor I heard was Deep Striking depends on how far away from the enemy you are. So, you can drop in 18" and not scatter. And, if the rules allow you to assault after DS, then bloodletters just became super nasty especially if there is an icon nearby. But, time will tell with this one.

yeah i don't know about the deepstrick myths...it just seems like it would make things rediculasly over powered since you deply on your turn so you get your shooting phase/run scatter and if your allowed to assault that same turn...my god, i dont' think i would ever see a ranged match again...ever, it will totally kill any use tzeentch had since you will be in combat instantly all the time. I suppose a range limitation is okay, forcing only your fast attack to be the ones getting assaults on good scatter rolls or something.

i think we will go the way of fantasy and have a 25% limitation breakup on troops elites fast heavys and all that jazz. which will instantly cut out alot of elite/ fast attack power that daemons rely on. only time will tell, maybe nothing will change noticeably who knows