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So from the consensus of the various threads, army lists, and debates concerning the new CD codex, it looks like Heralds are one of the big game changers this edition. In fact, I cannot fathom a competitive list that DOESN'T have at least 2 of them. The buffs they give to your units are simply invaluable. However the big question for me is how to best equip them, especially for a tournament worthy, TAAC list. Being able to take 4 HQs for one slot sounds good until you remember that its gonna cost around 80-100 per herald to give it the buffs you troops need. That means you are spending at least 300-400 just on your HQs. Here's a rundown on how I feel is the best way to equip each herald on a general basis, please feel free to contribute what you think are the best combinations and tell me where I'm wrong (and I probably am on many points ).

Herald of Khorne: First off, I'm not sold on the chariot. Not Fast, AV 12, and open topped IMO completely negate the 6" buff he gives since it's too easy to pop the chariot. Either run him on foot or, if putting him with Hounds (bloodcrushers PROBABLY not worth it anymore) take a juggernaut. As for Loci, I feel Greater Locus of Fury is the way to go, with exalted of wrath being a strong second place. WS 5 means you're gonna hit most things on 3s, and being S5 on the charge you're gonna wound on either 2s or 3s, in which case you want to put the most amount of attacks out there as possible, especially if assaulting MEQ since any that survive will be killing some of your bloodletters. If you have the points to spare, by all means give him an AP 2 weapon, Axe of Khorne works best but if you don't feel like modeling it the Etherblade is also serviceable.

Herald of Tzeentch. PRESCIENCE. If you're not giving him at least one divination power, you're doing it wrong. Mastery level 2 works best when combined with his loci since it keeps him under 100 points, but if you can spare the points by all means make him lvl 3. As for loci, no question, Exalted of Conjuration is the clear winner. Locus of change can just as easily hurt you as it can help you, and the lesser gives an assault buff to a troop unit that should never be in assault! Combined with prescience and 20 pink horror, the Exalted loci means you'll be throwing out a crapton of S6 attacks, making your horrors a threat to light vehicles, MCs, and even small TEQ units just on the shear amount of saves you're forcing them to make, to say nothing or what it'll do to regular infantry, especially if you lucky and get the divination power that ignores cover!. Don't bother giving him an upgraded weapon, with his low initiative, odds are he'll be killed before he gets to use it.

Herald of Nurgle: Greater Locus of Fecundity, NO QUESTION. Yes plaguebearers will almost always have at least a 3+ cover, but you will be rolling 1s and 2s from time to time. The other 2 Loci, again, give assault buffs on a unit that isn't made for excelling in assault (except against vehicles, but the loci don't help against them). Further, the other two loci depend on rolls of 6, these aren't daemonttes, they simply can't put out the amount of attacks to make that viable. FNP coupled with camping on ruins means your plaguebearers will take a lot of firepower to kill. If you're really worried about being assaulted, invest in the upgraded banner instead that give the unit 2+ poison for one turn instead. As for psykic powers, its a tough choice, but I'd say don't bother unless you have the points. If you do, stick with biomancy and pray for Iron Arm. Same with a weapon upgrade, just keep him cheaper with his FNP loci so you have more plaguebearers!

Herald of Slaanesh: A tough one, as all three of her loci seem extremely useful, so I'll save those for last. First yes, make her a psyker, lvl 2 if you can spare the points. Take one power from telepathy and one from Excess, pray you roll a 1 or 2 for that one Again, chariot sounds too fragile so I wouldn't bother. A steed is a great choice if you're putting her with a big block of seekers. Also by all means give her a weapon so she doesn't have to pray for 6s! I'd go for the etherblade just to be safe, but if you have a way to lower Inititive, either through Fiends or casting Acquiescence, then Witstealer sword is the way to go. Now for the loci, I feel that it really depends on what else you are bringing. A Khorne cannon is almost mandatory in this case, since its basically the only assault grenade equivalent you have. I5 daemonettes means you'll usually go before most things, but you have no assault grenades and their is always those precious few units that go before or at the same times as you that can really mess you up. I'd say, go with the exalted Locus, re-rolls means more attacks get through which means more chances to get those precious 6s you need. Not to mention forcing your opponent to accept a challenge and choosing which of his characters accept it. Couple with a khorne cannon and the Heralds high initiative, you can very easily take out nasty ICs and characters in a challenge. Just make sure you upgrade her weapon as well!

Well, without having a chance to playtest anything yet, I think most of you analysis is spot on. The one thing I am concerned about is the side effects of warpflame. If you don't kill a unit, you could be doing yourself a disservice as the FNP continues to get better and better on that unit. I may be worrying about nothing, but it is something I am concerned about. Additionally, I am not a huge fan of
a. having to take a leadership
b. hope my opponent fails deny the witch
c. then makes armor and FNP saves.

But, only playtesting will tell.

I agree that the heralds will be key to a good TAC list as well as their make up really determining what an army will look like. My herald unit currently has;

Herald of Slaanesh (Exalted Reward/Exalted Locus/Psyker Level 1/Steed)
Herald of Tzeentch (Exaulted Locus/Psyker Level 3)
Herald of Tzeentch (Exaulted Reward/Psyker Level 3)
Herald of Tzeentch (Exaulted Reward/Psyker Level 3)

The Slaanesh one rides with 20 seekers turning them into reroll machines and challenging as she sees fit at S5 AP2.

The three Tzeentch ones are in a big block of horrors, making the whole mess shoot at S6. One grabs up the Grimoire to support the seekers and the other with a reward carries the Portalglyph.

My blog will have a full rundown on the list I put on the table yesterday and what I plan to try tomorrow. Link in my sig.

The build that I have currently have tried and seem to work quite well.

Herald of Tzeentch w/ psychic mastery level three + Disc - 120

Hanging with a pack of Screamers and rolling 3 times on Divination. It might be worth taking the Grimoire of True Names to cast on your Deathstar unit.

Herald of Slaanesh w/ mighty aetherblade (greater reward), steed of slaanesh, exalted locus of beguilement - 110

A IC murderer & with 20 Seeker bodyguard it has a great delivery system , having Precognition on this unit makes it pretty insane.

Heralds undeniably are the cornerstone of most CD lists, but they have their issues still.

Khorne Heralds add more kill to the unit and are good character killers. They offer good buffs to their unit but there are better wayd to get them imo.

Slaanesh Heralds are outstanding at killing characters with their amazing initiative and loci. They suffer from poor toughness but that won't mean a thing in cc when their target is dead.

Nurgle Heralds are tough but ultimately only serve one purpose... to keep their brethren alive with FNP.

Horror Heralds buff the spells of Tzeentch and you can spam prescience. Good but my least favourite as Deny The Witch and other shenanigans can shut this unit down.

Puscifer wrote:
Slaanesh Heralds are outstanding at killing characters with their amazing initiative and loci. They suffer from poor toughness but that won't mean a thing in cc when their target is dead.

Most of what you said rings true, but I'd argue that low Strength is worse than low Toughness here - I've found they do have a tough time killing things on their own in challenges, without the backup of the entire unit's Attacks. Rending redresses this problem but in a challenge, you don't have the weight of numbers to stack enough Rending hits up to count.

I'll have to disagree on the Herald of Khorne locus, while they are both real close hatred vs rage, doing the maths, rage does indeed cause more wounds whenever you charge, but it is a difference on 1 wound, a 10 man blood letters + herald do around 16 wounds with rage and 15 with hatred. Against your average MEQ squad of 10 they are both overkill, however considering you might suffer some losses on your way to the close combat it is a justified buff. However in the case you get charged your rage locus is useless while your hatred one still would benefit you and help you on the dmg output. So for a few points I'd go with the hatred.

This is one of the few times the Greater Etherblade is good. Heralds of Slaanesh benefit greatly from them.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
As for the Khorne Loci, I was thinking of using Skarbrand. Both benefits table wide but better when you have mass numbers and can play this to your advantage with some skill.

 Lord Yayula wrote:
I'll have to disagree on the Herald of Khorne locus, while they are both real close hatred vs rage, doing the maths, rage does indeed cause more wounds whenever you charge, but it is a difference on 1 wound, a 10 man blood letters + herald do around 16 wounds with rage and 15 with hatred. Against your average MEQ squad of 10 they are both overkill, however considering you might suffer some losses on your way to the close combat it is a justified buff. However in the case you get charged your rage locus is useless while your hatred one still would benefit you and help you on the dmg output. So for a few points I'd go with the hatred.

Indeed, I also prefer the Greater Locus of Wrath as opposed to the Exalted Locus of Fury.

My current build for a Khornate Herald is as follows:

Herald of Khorne (140)
Juggernaut
Greater Reward
Locus of Wrath

I then stick him in a unit of 15 Flesh Hounds. This unit is absolute murder. I of course plan that I will be losing some, but 16 points for a WS5 S4 T4 W2 A2 model that is a Beast is a super good deal.

Assuming even 10 make it into combat, you're looking at 30 rerollable attacks from the Flesh-hounds at WS5 and S5. The only thing off-hand that could resist this is a 6+ man squad of Terminators or a unit of Paladins.

However, the Herald is pretty crazy too, and I always take a Juggernaut. For 140 points you then have a WS7 S5 T5 W3 I6 A4 model, pretty good deal! With a Greater Etherblade, he is S6!

Your thoughts on this are pretty comprehensive, just a few things I'd like to touch on:

I actually think that a Herald of Khorne would be better served by the Etherblade than the Axe of Khorne -- the 'killing blow' will only matter if you're fighting A) Something with FnP or B) a multi-wound character. Given that your herald has three attacks, I would go for the master-crafted weapon than the one that has a chance to instant death. If you're just fighting sergeants or grunts, even hitting on threes will miss more often than you'd like (you'll hit 2 of three attacks on average, if I've got it right). An MC sword hitting on 3+ basically means that all of your attacks hit. That's a really good thing. I'm sure there are situations where the Axe will be better, but remember, you don't have to choose until you actually fight the battle. I would always give him one of these two weapons. AP2 at initiative is now rare in 6th edition, there's usually one or two instances of it per codex, on like one or two special characters or a unique 30 point artifact. Daemons gets it for 10 points on anyone they want. I don't see why you shouldn't go for it on anyone who might see combat and could win it, unless you're completely strapped for points, and even then, it's just so useful to get that lesser reward.

This leads into a random point -- you probably don't need to model any particular weapon on your herald. Remember that you don't have to switch for the weapon, or take the Axe vs. the blade, until you're setting up for battle. To keep the flexibility of the gifts, you could just model what you feel is cool. Unless you're magnetizing everything, getting true WYSIWYG is going to be almost impossible for Daemons, because their weapons can change each battle.

I have said this before, Tzeentch heralds are potentially some of the best cheese in the Daemons Codex. Getting cheap Prescience has the possibility to be huge. The problems are with what you're casting it on. I've not yet seen Horrors used effectively. You need to get the Flickering Fire off through any psychic defenses the enemy has, then pass a DtW test that could be a 4+, then hit on BS3. Prescience only helps with the last one. The number of attacks is huge though, with a full horror unit. Putting the herald on a disc with some screamers is also a potential option, making them more like their WD version. Or you could just keep him on foot and hide him behind a wall. I actually think staying at Level 2 may be advised, as getting that third mastery level is much more costly than just upgrading to 2. It costs more to upgrade from 2 to 3 than to just get another herald. If you are putting him with horrors, remember that warpflame may hurt any shooting that you do afterwards -- if you have things that aren't warp flame, you may want to shoot the unit with them first, and use the Horrors and Herald to finish them off, thereby not giving them FnP. You can chance it a bit more if you're shooting at a T3 unit or have Enfeebled the target first.

Lastly, you probably don't need to make the heralds be 80 to 100 points per to make them effective. A Khorne herald with an AP2 weapon is only 65 points. A Tzeentch Herald at Level 2 is 70 points. The Loci I treat as upgrades to the unit rather than upgrades to the Herald (I also haven't looked enough at the Loci to see whether they're effective and efficient enough to be worthwhile). But yes, it does seem like HQ is one of the more crowded and used slots for Daemons.

The herrald of tzench goes with a group of horrors. Target the group with the re-roll to hit and the herrald piggyback on it. One of them will get through deny the witch. You can also give them +1 in S on those attacks. Nice.

Would you give a Nurgle Herald a psychic level if he is just going to be camping with plaguebearers?

Because you can!

Besides, you might roll enfeeble. ^_^

 Super Ready wrote:

Puscifer wrote:
Slaanesh Heralds are outstanding at killing characters with their amazing initiative and loci. They suffer from poor toughness but that won't mean a thing in cc when their target is dead.

Most of what you said rings true, but I'd argue that low Strength is worse than low Toughness here - I've found they do have a tough time killing things on their own in challenges, without the backup of the entire unit's Attacks. Rending redresses this problem but in a challenge, you don't have the weight of numbers to stack enough Rending hits up to count.

The greater reward makes her S5 with an AP2 sword. That is far better than anything a standard character would have. Her job is to do things like kill the librarians who are preventing blobs from running. She can do that.

 minigun762 wrote:
Would you give a Nurgle Herald a psychic level if he is just going to be camping with plaguebearers?

I wouldn't give a Nurgle Herald anything except Locus of Fecundity and an Etherblade. He's purely squad support and isn't really good at taking out anything better than squad leaders in cc.

Puscifer wrote:

 minigun762 wrote:
Would you give a Nurgle Herald a psychic level if he is just going to be camping with plaguebearers?

I wouldn't give a Nurgle Herald anything except Locus of Fecundity and an Etherblade. He's purely squad support and isn't really good at taking out anything better than squad leaders in cc.

You shouldn't even be trying to make your Nurgle herald good in challenges, he is simply to valuable with his Locus to even risk accepting one. IMO what I think you should do is always upgrade one Plaguebearer to a Plagueridden and give him the Etherblade so that he can accept and make challenges...

I don't think its worth it to take psyker level on Slaanesh and Nurgle heralds as their leadership is not that great. Its a lot of points to spend in hoping you can get those powers off.

Slaanesh should take an ap2 blade and the level 3 locus for rerolls.

Nurgle should take the level 2 locus and maybe a blade if you have leftover 10 points.

Khorne herald adds so little other than the +2 attacks locus I don't think I would bother as you are only few points off in buying another min squad of troops.

I definitely want to try Herald of Tzeentch +Disc +Level 2 psyker(Divination) +Exalted Gift (this will almost always be defaulted for the Grimoire of True Names unless I rolled Riftbringer which could be useful vs. certain matchups) and stick him in a unit of 9 Screamers. He could fly around handing out prescience buffs and throwing grimoire on the screamers for 3++ that rerolls 1s because they are daemons of Tzeentch and make the Lamprey's Bite more effective. Its expensive but I think would be excellent vs. anything but zooming flyers and your opponent has to deal with it.