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Hi all,

I've got a 1500pt tourney coming up this weekend and am having trouble nailing down a list. I've got a pretty set core army and a couple of variations to it, but the core is pretty solid and performs well.

Core:

Death Guard Meltdown v2 (Chaos Space Marines)
HQ - 145
Chaos Lord (145) blight grenades; aura of dark glory; The Black Mace; Mark of Nurgle.

Troops - 690
7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

835 points


I'm a big fan of Daemon Princes, jus cos they look cool and... well... I like them... so this is a variation I had though up, but the problem is that I don't know what else to put in, or even if the list will work.

Variation:

Death Guard Meltdown v2 (Chaos Space Marines)
HQ - 365
Chaos Lord (145) blight grenades; aura of dark glory; The Black Mace; Mark of Nurgle.

Daemon Prince (220)
Daemon of Nurgle; wings; power armour.

Troops - 690
7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

Heavy Support - 230
Chaos Land Raider (230)

Detachment: Fortifications Other - 100 Aegis Defence Lines (100) gun emplacement with quad-gun.

1,385 points

And then finally here's another variation that drops the DP:

Death Guard Meltdown (Chaos Space Marines)
HQ - 370
Typhus (230)

Sorcerer (140)
Mark of Nurgle; aura of dark glory; Psyker (Mastery Level 3).

Troops - 800
7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

7 Plague Marines (230)
power fist; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

25 Plague Zombies (110)

Heavy Support - 230
Chaos Land Raider (230)

Detachment: Fortifications Other - 100 Aegis Defence Lines (100) gun emplacement with quad-gun.

1,500 points


TL;DR: Is there any way to use a Nurgle DP in a fluffly way in any of the above lists, if so what sort of units compliment it?

In the second variation list give the daemon prince the black mace instead of the lord. this make the mace AP 2 instead of AP 4 as he is a MC. Give something else to the Chaos Lord. What do you plan to do if you come across tanks? I'm thinking Obliterators or Havocs for AT. (correct me if i'm wrong)

Geared is totally right there...Black Mace on the DP. Give your Lord Melta bombs at least. If Havoks are to expensive (Giving them MoN and such), go Preds with LC Sponsons for 115pts each. Remember you can throw Havok Launchers and Warpfire Gargoyles on your vehicles for anti-hoard. Then take whatever points are left and look at Rhinos for the Plague Marines (with Havok launchers?) to allow them to move across the board without getting shot to snot.

You would be able to save 60 points as well if you went with just basic champions with melta bombs. I really am not a fan of equipping our champions with anything unless you have extra points but thats just me. VotLW I feel the same way about and along with changing one squad to melta you would have enough for an Obliterator or even an ADL which would be helpful for the pesky fliers. Lasly something to consider is just running a Lord with Mark of Nurgle to sit back and man the ADL which would help free up more points. I am really torn on lords in this edition with my love for beating someones face in and then what I am actually finding more cost effective.

UPDATED LIST:

Death Guard Meltdown v2 (Chaos Space Marines)
HQ - 385
Chaos Lord (120)
blight grenades; aura of dark glory; Mark of Nurgle; power weapon; melta bombs.

Daemon Prince (265)
Daemon of Nurgle; The Black Mace; wings; power armour.

Troops - 650
7 Plague Marines (220)
power weapon; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

7 Plague Marines (220)
power weapon; 2× plasma gun; Veterans of the Long War.

7 Plague Marines (210)
power weapon; 2× meltagun; Veterans of the Long War.

Heavy Support - 362
Chaos Predator (132)
warpflame gargoyles; Havoc launcher; sponson lascannons.

Chaos Land Raider (230)

Detachment: Fortifications
Other - 100
Aegis Defence Lines (100)
gun emplacement with quad-gun.

1,497 points

Meltaplagues run in LR with Lord, camp objectives where possible, plasmaplagues stick back with pred and ADL.

Thoughts?

Question: is it worth giving psyker levels to a DP?

If you give him psyker level 2 or above then yes in my opinion. he has too roll one from his Mark (so in your case Nurgle) and then gets to pick another set too roll on, my advice is biomancy

I have to agree with above, but he will be way to expensive if you do give him levels IMO. At that point a Sorc with 3 levels (base +2 levels), even in Terminator armor is /half/ the points of your DP. And lets be honest, if your doing psyker stuff, you want at least 3 rolls. Just be glad that the Chaos stuff is 3 powers so you have a 33% chance of getting what you actually want with one roll. I think the Nurgle stuff is kinda weak, but the debuff+ the Biomancy debuff stacks. I would go Nurgle 1, Biomancy 2 and hope you get lucky.

I will point out VotLW gives you +1 Ld on a Fearless unit (so nothing) and allows you to re-roll misses on the first turn of Close Combat. It is really hot on non-Fearless units like bikes, Oblits, 'normal' CSM, and units expecting to get into CC, but not everything. That is 21pts you would be saving right there.

Are you expecting to assault from the LR? If so, get a Dirge Caster because enemy units within 6" can't fire overwatch.

For a very little amount of points, you could get a Icon of Despair on your Melta gun squad. Any unit that is not Fearless or has ATSKNF must make a Ld check at the start of each fight sub-phase or be WS1. This might be the one unit to have VotLW on if they are 'assaulters'. Make sure you have it on the Lord as well.

If you drop the VotLW from the 2 plasma units, get a Dirge Caster for the LR, VotLW for your Lord, and a Icon of Despair for your melta unit, you will be at 1502pts.

I ended up running the following list on Saturday, though only one guy turned up so we just had a friendly he played a Tau gunline, and beat my ass back into the warp.

Death Guard Meltdown v2 (Chaos Space Marines)
HQ - 450
Chaos Lord (110) Mark of Nurgle; power weapon; aura of dark glory.

Daemon Prince (340)
Daemon of Nurgle; The Black Mace; Psyker (Mastery Level 3); wings; power armour.

Troops - 599
7 Plague Marines (203)
melta bombs; 2× plasma gun.

7 Plague Marines (203)
melta bombs; 2× plasma gun.

7 Plague Marines (193)
melta bombs; 2× meltagun.

Heavy Support - 350
Chaos Predator (120)
warpflame gargoyles; sponson lascannons.

Chaos Land Raider (230)

Detachment: Fortifications Other - 100 Aegis Defence Lines (100) gun emplacement with quad-gun.

1,499 points

Some silly moves on my part, and I can't help but feel that the list was sub-par, any tips?

warpflame gargoyles i think are just gimicky. cool, but not worth the points. And that demon prince IMHO is holding your list back. thats 340 points invest into a potentially easy kill. Tau are always the bane of my daemon prince (them and there silly laserpointers of death). The raider is kinda meh to. plague marines can hold their own in close combat i supose, but i dont think there ment to go across field and look for it. Mor like sit on objective, shot stuff coming at them so that when they do get assaulted theres not much left to go staby-stab with the scab knives. Maybe drop the raider and prince, get some MoN spawn or bikes and put your lord on a bike to ride with them (giving him the black mace again). then get som MoN oblits or havoks for some more heavy suport

 Monkee wrote:
I ended up running the following list on Saturday, though only one guy turned up so we just had a friendly he played a Tau gunline, and beat my ass back into the warp.

Some silly moves on my part, and I can't help but feel that the list was sub-par, any tips?

Here is the problem... any list, no matter how good it is, can not work well if played poorly. Was it really the list that failed or you? What failed to preform? What did well? What did you want to do with the list? Are you a gunline or are you attacking? Tell us what happened and we can try to help you with something that fits into your play style better. Because if you got stomped that bad, I have to question if Naked Rhinos with 5 man squads with double plasma to go with your LR and Pred would be the better choice or to go gunline and ditch the Plague Marines for CSMs with a Heavy weapon or something like a second Pred to give you additional long range fire power. If the DP and the LR sucked, then the two choices are double up on them or drop them. You also have to take more than one match into account, like 3 matches at least. Then afterward look at your list and go check (positive), pass, or Negitive. Then if it was a poor choice by you, alter it. Did you place the LR early and in the open and then your foe placed a long range AT weapon in line with it, it is not the vehicle's fault that it got shot on turn 1 before it could even move. That Negitive would move to a pass. After 3 matchs, if something is all Negitives or 2 neg 1 pass, consider dropping it and swapping it out.

I will note everyone pretty much said no to the DP with Psyker levels, yet you did it anyways... and he was marker light grounded and then shot with Str 10 rail guns and failed his 5++ Invuln, correct? Then they blasted the heck out of the Land Raider and Pred next because that was the only long range fire you had. Then you were done. Am I far off here?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 WarlordEXE wrote:
warpflame gargoyles i think are just gimicky.

I don't think a 5pt piece of equipment really mattered at that point when your wasting more points putting VotLW on Fearless troops. Least that 5pts can do something for him everytime it shoots at troops.

 BlkTom wrote:

I will note everyone pretty much said no to the DP with Psyker levels, yet you did it anyways... and he was marker light grounded and then shot with Str 10 rail guns and failed his 5++ Invuln, correct? Then they blasted the heck out of the Land Raider and Pred next because that was the only long range fire you had. Then you were done. Am I far off here?

Oddly enough not at all, he spent the first three turns markerlighting my LR, then failing intensely at 4x TL Railgun @ BS5 w/no cover save. For three turns. Hell, my luck with those rolls is the only reason I got to turn 3.

Having said that, the entire army was reliant on having the DP, LR and Pred survive long enough to put a dint in him, then the PM's walking up behind and mopping up squishy infantry.

I'm trying to keep my lists fun and semi-competitive at this FLGS because that's the atmosphere we're going for, however there are a couple of guys who bring much more competitive lists all the time and trounce the rest of us. I'm left with the choice to either play the kind of list that we're trying to promote, or go balls-deep into a competitive WAAC list.

 BlkTom wrote:

What did you want to do with the list? Are you a gunline or are you attacking?

Basically I wanted to run the tanks up the middle with PM's chillin' out behind them, try to keep the tanks alive for a couple of turns to kill gak and soak up some fire. Ideally I would focus on the greatest threat to my PM's and DP with the tanks. The PM's charge in turn 3 or 4, making killy killy death punch to the core of my opponent, and the DP just smashes gak until it stops moving.

Admittedly this plan did not actually happen largely due to terrain placement, I just didn't have the room to move my tanks around.

I tend to not go mastery 3 on anything. It's expensive for one, and two you're really only in it for one good power out of the two (two good ones if you're lucky). Add to that the fact he's rocking the Black Mace (which is awesome) and you are going to want to get him on the ground smashing faces as soon as possible. Most of the psychic powers won't matter when it's cc time, and if he gets himself perished then you've lost ALL of those points. I personally don't think it's worth the risk.
Now seeing as how I only run Plague Marines (to varying degrees of success to be sure) I have plenty to say on the matter of the seven man squad with 2x plasma. You will lose a man or two to gets hot over the course of a protracted firefight (this varies obviously, dependent on the dice) but they pack a nasty wallop, will irritate termies and glance rhinos to hell and back. Put your PMs in the rhinos. When the can is finally opened your opponent will then have to deal with the innards, and they generally don't like it.
I'd ditch the LR, pred, and aegis for Oblits (but that is a flavor issue).
I do have a question though. Why run aura instead of sigil? If the lord had FNP I wouldn't bother with either, but since you have to pay anyway why not buy up to the better save?

 Monkee wrote:

 BlkTom wrote:

I will note everyone pretty much said no to the DP with Psyker levels, yet you did it anyways... and he was marker light grounded and then shot with Str 10 rail guns and failed his 5++ Invuln, correct? Then they blasted the heck out of the Land Raider and Pred next because that was the only long range fire you had. Then you were done. Am I far off here?

Oddly enough not at all, he spent the first three turns markerlighting my LR, then failing intensely at 4x TL Railgun @ BS5 w/no cover save. For three turns. Hell, my luck with those rolls is the only reason I got to turn 3.

Having said that, the entire army was reliant on having the DP, LR and Pred survive long enough to put a dint in him, then the PM's walking up behind and mopping up squishy infantry.

I'm trying to keep my lists fun and semi-competitive at this FLGS because that's the atmosphere we're going for, however there are a couple of guys who bring much more competitive lists all the time and trounce the rest of us. I'm left with the choice to either play the kind of list that we're trying to promote, or go balls-deep into a competitive WAAC list.

 BlkTom wrote:

What did you want to do with the list? Are you a gunline or are you attacking?

Basically I wanted to run the tanks up the middle with PM's chillin' out behind them, try to keep the tanks alive for a couple of turns to kill gak and soak up some fire. Ideally I would focus on the greatest threat to my PM's and DP with the tanks. The PM's charge in turn 3 or 4, making killy killy death punch to the core of my opponent, and the DP just smashes gak until it stops moving.

Admittedly this plan did not actually happen largely due to terrain placement, I just didn't have the room to move my tanks around.

Ok Monkee... let me try something here and go with the feedback for the report. To me, it is key your attacking and that you want to charge. You want to keep it fun and fluffy, yet competitive. You want a DP as a key fig if at all possible. Let me see...

Here is something without a DP

Lord - 135pts
MoN, VotLW, Sigil of Corruption, Melta Bomb, PF

Warpsmith - 145pts
Dark Aura, MoN, VotLW

Plague Marines x8 - 250pts
Melta x2, Melta Bomb, LC, VotLW, IoD

Plague Marines x6 - 179pts
Plasma x2, Melta Bomb

Plague Marines x6 - 179pts
Plasma x2, Melta Bomb

Cultists - 67pts
+3 Cultists, Flamer

LR - 235pts
Dirge Caster

Pred - 105pts
TL LC, Dirge Caster

Pred - 105pts
TL LC, Dirge Caster

ADL - 100pts
Quad

1500pts

Cultists hang out at the ADL using the gun. WP and Lord ride with the 8 man Plague squad in the LR. The WP can attempt to repair it every turn if it gets glanced till the squad is ready to assault. The two six man squads walk up behind the Preds and LR. I dropped the Sponsons on the Preds to give the main gun a TL LC since your only firing 1 weapon when your moving and it doesn't pay to snap-fire the LCs. Have the Preds be out infront of the LR some to really spread out the Dirge Caster effect and maybe give the LR some cover saves. I will also point out, for the cost of 3 PMs, you could get 2 Rhinos with maybe some Dirge Casters. If you don't like the WP, you could switch him out for a Dark Apostal who could be interesting.

I was going to make a DP/Lord list for you, but I don't have time. Let me know how you feel about this first.

In a tourney at 1500 a quad-gun is woefully inefficient for anti-air, heldrakes are arguably the best unit in the codex so utilise them

@BlkTom: cheers bro, much appreciated. Honestly it was just this particular tourney that I wanted to run the DP; I'm aware it can be a sub-par choice, and I've had much, much more effectiveness coming from a lord+sorc. My baby was getting dusty, and papa nurgle wanted him back in the field.

Double Pred is actually a brilliant idea, I never thought of that because I only own one predator; I reckon I'll borrow a Pred next time and give it a shot.

I'm usually the guy who runs fully mechanised SM armies, and have been trying to shy away from mech lists since sixth, mostly for a change than anything else (though I've gotta admit, giving away first blood to a blown metal bawks is not fun). I'll look into some more transports as well.

@Tiarna: The helldrake is probs next on the buy list, the only other things that might precede it are blight drones, cos they look disgusting, and I wanna give them a good shot. Also because I'm planning a zombie dragon/helldrake conversion for more nurgley goodness.

Thanks. If you feel your Preds would be hanging back more, going triple LC or AC/LC sponsons are probably best. I feel Preds were and still are one of the better heavy choices in the Codex. With the LR out there, hopefully that will draw more fire than the Preds to let them do some damage. IF you run into hoards, just tank-shock them.

If you don't want to do Rhinos, then don't. But I feel you might be running to few troops with PMs to really pull off an assault foot list. Also, if you want to charge with the PMs, they can't fire Rapid Fire weapons (Bolters and Plasma). I am just saying this as a reminder. I was able to go 3 Five man squads and the 7 man assault squad of PMs (one only had flamers and was manning the ADL with a Icarus LC instead of the quad), but I felt 5 was to small of a number to be effective and a small squad of cultists could do the same job as backfield defence. I felt the BS 3 needed the TL Quad to hit. But if you don't like the Cultists, that was the troop option I was looking at (22 PMs).

To be honest on the WS/DA choice over a sorc was because I wanted him in the LR and you can't use Psyker powers in a vehicle. He has to be out to cast so I feel those two HQ choices ( or a second Lord) are the better choices. It really is that or ditch the LR, because the other two squads are to small for a sorc and will get shot to bits.

I think a DP /can/ work, but they are so freaking expensive now that I don't think it is feasible in a low point game. I would have to say 1850 would be the level where doing the old fashioned double DP list might still work. When I started making up that list, I was doing the DP at first and he really was around 300pts for everything and it kinda came down to having vehicles or not. If your list didn't have vehicles (or just the two Preds) I think I could have pulled it off and had big enough squads to take the fire and keep coming. Probably something like the following....

Lord - 125pts
MoN, Sigil of Corruption, Melta bomb, Lightining Claw

Sorc - 155pts
+2 levels, Sigil of Corruption, Melta bomb, MoN (Nurgle 1, Biomancy 2)

9x Plague Marines - 276pts
2x Plasma guns, Melta bomb, PF

9x Plague Marines - 276pts
2x Plasma guns, Melta bomb, PF

7x Plague Marines - 198pts
2x Flamers, melta bomb, LC

5x Plague Marines - 155pts
2x Plasma guns, Melta bomb

Pred - 115pts
LC sponsons

Pred - 115pts
LC sponsons

ADL - 85pts
Icarus LC

1500pts

The Preds sit still behind the ADL with the small plasma squad who man the gun and blast away with covering fire and can even add into AA fire if needed. The flamer squad follows up the two main squads and burns out cover save based troops. Everyone has Melta Bombs for vehicles/MCs and the two squads with ICs in them each have a PF... so if your challenging a guy in 2+ armor, use the fists. If it is 3+, use the IC weapons. I gave the Flamer squad a Champ with a LC just because they might be up there and get in combat. I like the LC over a PW because it is same points, I don't care about number of attacks (PW will get you +1 attack), but it has the re-roll on failed wounds (Shred special rule). If you rather have the power weapons, feel free to switch them out.

Good luck!