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I ""LOVE""" the models, just so nightmarish.
In a mostly nurgle army are they that good? I know whats on paper and what what is good is usually 2 different matters.
my origonal plan was to give them the icon and have them bounce cover to cover using their shrouded bonus to get them closer to forward objectives...then deepstrike in some plague bearers..then have them go after some targets.
Any thoughts at the best way to use these guys?

They look good. Although I've only run up against them once. It was a group of 4 that my splinter cannons took out in T1. So I didn't really get to see what they were capable of.

In an all nurgle army, yes, they are good.

In an army where everything is SNP, they have much needed mobility.

They can also use a standard and act as a mobile teleport beacon for any deepstriking units you have. This is a good use of them.

I know some people give the leader an ether blade, the instant death on 1 attack upgrade, the 2+ poison for one turn standard (which effects the etherblade), and then try to use them to hunt down MCs. Personally I don't like this, sure you might get luck and kill the opponent in 1 go. But if you are unlucky the the MC using st 10 attacks will ID your flies pretty fast. Use with prescience and gimoire for best effects.

On their own merits they are pretty decent. Tough with many wounds and not bad in cc. Just stay away from those str 10 weapons.

I wouldn't bother with any of the upgrades for general play, keep the basic and get more stuff in your army.

To me, the biggest downside to them is that nurgle heralds do not have access to a fly. All other daemon cavalry can be supported by their herald, but not nurgle.

With what squad size are you finding the best success? The minimal 3 or larger squads of 5+? I'm thinking of running them combined with Beasts of nurgle and nurgle DP's with wings, or maybe use an icon to DS a GoC. Does this sound like a solid idea?

I ran a squad of 3 allied with my CSM for a long time. They ran up the board with some nurgle bikes, but for the most part they didn't do much besides drawing fire from the rest of the army. The 1-2 turns of shooting they soaked up was valuable for sure, but they were just OK overall.

The problem they have in combat is that they themselves aren't durable while in combat and don't inherently ignore armor. A lot of their survivability comes from shrouded and hoping terrain. In combat they only get 5++ so often lose some wounds to units with plenty attacks or decent strength. Also with only S4 and poison they aren't exactly killing units left and right. With Ws3 and no AP they tend to not deal a lot of wounds themselves and bounce off anything with a decent save.

If you run them i suggest taking a Champion with an Aetherblade and buy the unit 3+ poison. This gives the champion 4 ap2 attacks with 3+ poison and master crafted thus gives the unit some bite and more consistency in combat damage. Also should probably take 4-5 but its less important then the aforementioned upgrades.