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I like spread the sickness. I think the nerf to bring it down and abhor the witch have reduced the expectation of what is a good score for each secondary. I think hoping to get 15VP for each of your secondaries is wishful thinking now.
The good thing about Spread the sickness is with a couple of cheap poxwalkers units you can pretty much guarantee a minimum of 6VP without reducing the effectiveness of any of your army. The poxwalkers are only there to stand on the objective and not die. So almost passively you can score 6VP in turn one and two. You're not neutralising an important unit by doing an action.
When your big units of PMs or terminators are depleted in later rounds, you're not so reticent to do an action with them and pick up a further 3 or even 6VP.
9VP from a secondary isn't too bad, especially when you get them from doing what you'd be doing anyway.
Deploy scramblers only nets you 10. Raise banners can only be done by squishy cultists or expensive PM units and to get decent points it needs to be done early when you most need your damage dealers dealing damage. Plus of course your banners can be taken off you...

I think the issue with spread the sickness is the "uncontested" part. There is a mission specific secondary which works very similar, and it's extremely easy for a mobile opponent to deny you to get it for anything but your home objectives.

I am starting to think that despite it being painful to lose contagions, mixing in a nurgle daemon patrol might give DG a lot more of the early board presence it is lacking.

3 nurgling units can not only put 3 scout units up the board even before battle starts, more importantly, it will prevent your opponent from move blocking you. DG wants to get onto the midboard objectives and fight on it. But given that most of our best troops are land based without the fly keyword, it is extremely easy to move block DG.

3 nurgling units up the board will go a long way towards preventing that move blocking from happening. I would much prefer to play a pure DG army, but outside of Mortarion and bloat drones, we don't have anything else that flies. Being move blocked at our starting deployment is going to hurt DG alot. Because not only does your opponent get even more turns to shoot at you, but you are not scoring even primary objectives while being move blocked.

Eldenfirefly wrote:
I am starting to think that despite it being painful to lose contagions, mixing in a nurgle daemon patrol might give DG a lot more of the early board presence it is lacking.

They don't lose all contagions, do they? I read it that they only lose Nurgle's Gift but they should still get Plague Company contagions.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
If they're in a pure DG detachment, of course.

Losing the -1T aura in exchange for nurglings and epidimus and maybe a tree sounds reasonable to me

Alright after following this thread I came up with following meme list


General plan here is to abuse flash contagion. While the unit in question won’t get both contagions, having the flexibility to pick certain units to get certain buffs is very nice. It’s a bummer that I can’t get the extra -1 AP on the blightlords, but at the very least I can use them and the DP to shut down Re-rolls and potentially nasty overwatch’s. Finally it’s quite nice that using flash contagion will buff both the DP’s and LoC contagion range.

To change this list I am thinking of dropping a deathshroud in order, to give wings to the DP, upgrade the the LoC to have a grenade + a manreaper, and change the plagueburst crawler with flamers to have cannons instead. I normally am a proponent of boys over toys, but all these changes have synergies with my list.

 lare2 wrote:

Eldenfirefly wrote:
I am starting to think that despite it being painful to lose contagions, mixing in a nurgle daemon patrol might give DG a lot more of the early board presence it is lacking.

They don't lose all contagions, do they? I read it that they only lose Nurgle's Gift but they should still get Plague Company contagions.

Plague Company contagions only spread from the model which has the trait, plus one more if you use the stratagem.

Eldenfirefly wrote:
I am starting to think that despite it being painful to lose contagions, mixing in a nurgle daemon patrol might give DG a lot more of the early board presence it is lacking.

3 nurgling units can not only put 3 scout units up the board even before battle starts, more importantly, it will prevent your opponent from move blocking you. DG wants to get onto the midboard objectives and fight on it. But given that most of our best troops are land based without the fly keyword, it is extremely easy to move block DG.

3 nurgling units up the board will go a long way towards preventing that move blocking from happening. I would much prefer to play a pure DG army, but outside of Mortarion and bloat drones, we don't have anything else that flies. Being move blocked at our starting deployment is going to hurt DG alot. Because not only does your opponent get even more turns to shoot at you, but you are not scoring even primary objectives while being move blocked.

Have been toying with that idea as well.
But in that case I would go for a nurgle Detachment with 1-3 x Nurglings + Warptime Jetpack Sorcerer + maybe a poxbringer if you want to.
That extra movement could be of great use for Mortarion and PM / BL.
Or go for Ahriman on disk instead in an detachment without Nurglings to get 3 easy psychic powers.

 Jidmah wrote:

 lare2 wrote:

Eldenfirefly wrote:
I am starting to think that despite it being painful to lose contagions, mixing in a nurgle daemon patrol might give DG a lot more of the early board presence it is lacking.

They don't lose all contagions, do they? I read it that they only lose Nurgle's Gift but they should still get Plague Company contagions.

Plague Company contagions only spread from the model which has the trait, plus one more if you use the stratagem.

I think he is referring to the fact it will extend the range both their contagions abilities and only one model gains the additional <plague company> contagion.

Yeah, I was mainly referring to losing the -1 toughness contagion. In any case. I don't think people want to get up that close to DG units in the first place. So, losing the -1 Toughness contagion in order to soup in nurglings ... I think on an overall basis, we gain more from the tactical flexibility than we lose from being more lethal in close quarters.

I often felt that CSM was playing with one hand tied behind its back because we didn't have aeroplanes, we didn't have artillery that can shoot out of line of sight, we didn't have scouts, and we didn't have snipers. Or we needed to jump through hoops to somehow get these. I wouldn't complain if CSM units were more powerful to make up for this, but that's obviously not the case.

But DG has PBC as artillery, and Nurgle daemons has nurglings scouts. So, at least this elevates somewhat the disadvantages CSM used to have. Even though it means we have to soup together DG and nurgle, but at least I can now get artillery and scouts which CSM previously didn't have. Not having units with supersonic or snipers isn't quite as bad.


On a separate note, has anyone considered either 5 possessed in a Rhino or 5 plague marines with special melee weapons like flail in a Rhino. The Rhino can move advance quickly up the board. And the two units I mentioned are actually pretty scary in close combat. They will destroy most chaff and still put a hole into tougher units too. If the Rhino is on an objective, destroy the Rhino and out pops the infantry onto the objective. So thats still 10 wounds at T5 with DR you have to chew through. We don't need to have mass rhinos, but maybe one or two like that might give us some added tactical flexibility.

We have a 50% chance of going first, and going first means VP for primary objectives are counted top of turn 2. This means we literally need to get onto the primary midboard objectives on Turn 1. If we are relying on our infantry to do it, we could be just one bad advance roll away from not being able to get onto the midboard primary objective turn 1. (And this doesn't even factor in if we get move blocked).

Hey guys, I'm going to be playing a 2k game Sunday(most likely against blood angels) here's the list Im.thinking about bringing

Mortarion's Anvil
Battalion
-1cp for extra relic
HQ: 2
Lord of Contagion 120pts
Warp Insect Hive
Revoltingly Resilient

Malignant Plaguecaster 95pts

Troop: 4

20 Poxwalkers 100pts

10 Poxwalkers 50pts

7 Plague Marines 187pts
Champ: Plasma Gun/Daemonic Plague Blade
Plasma Gun
Blight Launcher
Flail

7 Plague Marines 177pts
Champ: Daemonic Plague Blade/BP
Plasma Gun
Blight Launcher
Flail

Fast Attack: 3
Foetid Bloat Drone 135pts
Flesh Mower

Foetid Bloat Drone 135pts
Flesh Mower

Myphitic Blighthauler 140pts

Elites: 3
3 Deathshroud Terminators 150pts

5 Blightlord Terminators 215pts
Flail
Combi Melta
Reaper Autocannon

Tallyman 70pts

Plague Surgeon 75pts
Fuegaris Helm

Heavy Support: 2
Plagueburst Crawler 175pts
Entropy Cannons

Plagueburst Crawler 175pts
Entropy Cannons

LoC deepstrikes in with Deathshrouds. Tallyman and Plague Surgeon buff a unit of Plague Marines. Poxwalkers screen Plagueburst Crawlers. Drones and Blighthauler engage forward enemy units. I'm not completely sold on the solo Blighthauler. Might be worth dropping it and something else to get a 3rd Crawler or a 3rd Bloat Drone with Mower. Since I'm running so many vehicles I'm wondering about using a winged daemon prince and switching to the Inexorable or possibly Poxmomgers for vehicle buffing.

As far as the “bringing Nurglings is worth breaking mono-deathguard” discussion goes, I have to say I’m torn. Certainly gaining the center of the board quickly is extremely valuable, but a -1 T aura might worth giving this up. The thing is, I do believe that this effect will be very relevant in a lot of matchups. Since we have no great obsec, being able to killing opposing units in 1 turn becomes a lot more important. Contagions go a long way to making this happen, so I don’t love the idea of giving it up, even for nurglings.

Also as just posted a list like this, I have to bring up that we do get some synergy for taking 2 deathguard detachments. I don’t think most deathguard soup lists (that aren’t just morty) are going to want to bring more than 2 detachments, so mono-deathguard still grant flexibility bonuses that good soup lists won’t have.

If you are torn between the two, GW balanced it perfectly

 Jidmah wrote:
If you are torn between the two, GW balanced it perfectly

Yes they balanced it spot on

 l0k1 wrote:
Hey guys, I'm going to be playing a 2k game Sunday(most likely against blood angels)

If you're probably going to be playing against Blood Angels, bring a Foul Blightspawn with Revolting Stench-Vats. It's insanely brutal against them - completely negates all of their bonuses.

 Marshal Loss wrote:

 l0k1 wrote:
Hey guys, I'm going to be playing a 2k game Sunday(most likely against blood angels)

If you're probably going to be playing against Blood Angels, bring a Foul Blightspawn with Revolting Stench-Vats. It's insanely brutal against them - completely negates all of their bonuses.

Agreed. In a ferryman detachment you can drop a CP each turn to extend that aura out to 12". That's neutralising their +1 to wound and all those extra attacks for black rage, hateful assault etc across 24" of your lines. Be aware they will get their bonuses if you charge them though so in some cases you might actually be better off taking the charge from them then hitting them back.

Abaddon303 wrote:

 Marshal Loss wrote:

 l0k1 wrote:
Hey guys, I'm going to be playing a 2k game Sunday(most likely against blood angels)

If you're probably going to be playing against Blood Angels, bring a Foul Blightspawn with Revolting Stench-Vats. It's insanely brutal against them - completely negates all of their bonuses.

Agreed. In a ferryman detachment you can drop a CP each turn to extend that aura out to 12". That's neutralising their +1 to wound and all those extra attacks for black rage, hateful assault etc across 24" of your lines. Be aware they will get their bonuses if you charge them though so in some cases you might actually be better off taking the charge from them then hitting them back.

Hmmm strong points. Perhaps I'll drop the Blighthauler for the Blightspawn with Stench Vats and throw the extra points into adding more bodies to one of the units of Plague Marines.

What's everyone's thoughts on the LoV vs LoC?

I'm starting a small DG force since I got a really good deal, and wanted to know what peoples opinions are. I'm leaning toward the LoC, but I would like to hear more experienced DG players on these.

Everytime I build a list now the LoC inevitably gets chosen. It's weird. For me he's went from nothing to pretty much my first choice for a lord and has even superceded a Prince.

Personally, I see the LoV as just a new weapons option to replace the reaper with dual plague spitters that has a silly stratagem to blow up harlequin troupes.

With so many characters (tallyman, plague surgeon, blightspawn, HQs) I feel it's almost necessary to burn 2-4 CP in a 2k game for gifts of decay and extra warlord traits. At first I was skeptical blowing 1/3 of my CP before the game begins, but I play Alpha Legion and use 3 CP for Forward Operatives every game plus with Tallyman's ability activating on both players command phases I don't think CP will be a problem. Thoughts?

If you've got a tallyman, I reckon you are all good. If not, I'm often skeptical about the value of these traits. Especially on slow moving models. Unless they are Veil of Darkness level of game changing.

Umbros wrote:
If you've got a tallyman, I reckon you are all good. If not, I'm often skeptical about the value of these traits. Especially on slow moving models. Unless they are Veil of Darkness level of game changing.

Well I was thinking 2 CP for relics + 1 free one gives Plague Surgeon, Tallyman, and Blightspawn their specific relics. As for warlord traits, giving Arch Contaminator to a LoC, a Contagion trait to one of the other characters(maybe Plaguecaster for the strat that buff range and give the contagion to another model), and another trait to one of the characters for fun.

The Internet certainly seems fond of the LoC - but I'd like to understand why. Is it synergy with say flash outbreak? I guess its a source of 3 damage attacks that you can't easily get elsewhere. It just seems to me the LoV at least has the double heavy flamer to (hopefully) do some work without being at the mercy of long charge rolls.

I think Daemon Princes are in this odd place because wings make them expensive but the idea of not taking them feels very alien. I'd be interested to see if people experiment without the wings as its another source of 3 damage - and 6 attacks hitting on 2s should be more consistent than 5 attacks hitting on 3s (even if plague weapon rerolls to wound can mitigate this.) Throw in a psychic power and it seems a reasonable choice.

Interested to see what people think of this list Vs space wolves I've got this weekend:

Basic plan is the tallyman hangs back in a bubble with the Contemptor and rapier for the subject hits on 6s on high rate of fire weaponry. Will probably keep the entropy PBC back as well, especially if there's two home objectives.

The two FBDs run off on their own to cause carnage.

Poxies hopefully fly under the radar long enough to spread contagion on at least three objectives.

DP, Caster, Blightspawn, PMs, Termis and the spitter PBC apply forward pressure in the centre of the board and hopefully stand up to a space wolf charge and then counter. I can extend our the blightspawn aura to hopefully neuter a lot of the charge impact of things like thunderwolf cavalry and then smash them back.

Spawn go wherever they are needed really.

I'm hoping i I have enough presence in the army to hold 2/3 objectives all game. I feel a little thin on the ground but I've got some big toys in the army. Is it maybe too many? Should I be gearing up for more bodies to resist the space wolf assault?

Tyel wrote:
The Internet certainly seems fond of the LoC - but I'd like to understand why. Is it synergy with say flash outbreak? I guess its a source of 3 damage attacks that you can't easily get elsewhere. It just seems to me the LoV at least has the double heavy flamer to (hopefully) do some work without being at the mercy of long charge rolls.

Well, the manreaper allows you to massacre stuff like harlequins, orks or daemons, while the plague reaper has been upgraded into a better thunderhammer that wounds pretty much every vehicles in the game on 3s and gravis or bikes ons 2s with re-rolls, with no less than 5 attacks. Either way you have a powerful counter-charge unit that can seriously mess up anything that wants to fight with whatever unit he is buffing.

I think Daemon Princes are in this odd place because wings make them expensive but the idea of not taking them feels very alien. I'd be interested to see if people experiment without the wings as its another source of 3 damage - and 6 attacks hitting on 2s should be more consistent than 5 attacks hitting on 3s (even if plague weapon rerolls to wound can mitigate this.) Throw in a psychic power and it seems a reasonable choice.

Honestly, having a 4++ in combat is more valuable than than the psychic power since blades is gone. If you want more attacks, you can just drop the explosive outbreak pathogen on the LoC.

Mortal wounds list?
After reading up on the leaks for Dark Angels, durability seems like it’s going to be something most lists plan for. Additionally, they have basically Transhuman army wide. A -1 toughness aura and adding to wound and rerolling are all basically moot against transhuman.

That got me thinking, mortals bypass both transhuman and the 4+ jink from Ravenwing.

What’s a good list composition to maximize mortals?

I’ve been trying to make Typhus/poxwalkers work with a Wretched detachment to get as much pestilential fallout as possible but am having a tough time getting the correct warlord traits and auras where I need them.
Any ideas?

So how do you guys rank the new Plague companies? My order of ranking is below:

1) The Inexorable because-1 AP is good in almost every situation in both melee and shooting phases (increase to offense)

2) Mortarian’s Anvil because the aura of no rerolls is really powerful against some units a d combos. It some instances it can really improve your survival (increease to defense)

3) The Ferrymen on paper halving enemy movement is huge. It is very powerful when it works, but will happen less often. However, the droning strategem is very powerful allowing 12” auras (increase in utility)

All the others are meh depending on if you want more offense, defense, or utility you will likely choose the above plague companies. There is some interesting options with Mortarian’s Chosen Sons strategem, but I don’t think it makes up for the above losses.

Mortarion's Anvil is strongest in my opinion. That aura of no rerolls is super good. And the strategem to heroically intervene 3 inches with any unit is amazing too.

How do you rank the foetid virion? They have really seen a massive improvement across the board and I wish I could have them all in my lists. So I have decided to rank them below:

1) The Tallyman. No matter what you play style is the Tallyman’s seven fold chant is useful and likely will give you 4-5 extra CP a game and helps off the CP cost of being forced to buy multiple detachments to run more than one “Lord”. The +1 to hit is just the cherry on top. An auto include he is just that good. (Utility)

2) The Foul Blightspawn. Against other melee armies this model can absolutely crush their game plan. When he takes the stench-vats his ability to take away all charge bonuses against armies like blood angles, white scars, etc is crippling. His plague sprayer just adds insult to injury. (Defensive)

3) Plague Surgeon the ability to give units a 6+++ can really start to add up. Additionally, the ability to heal models such as the LoC can really make your HQs more durable. What really makes him interesting is using Fulgrim’s Helm and The Droning Strategem. If you run him it makes sense to always give him the Arch-Contaminator or Living Plague Warlord traits. (Defensive)

4) Biologus Putrifier. His ability to make 6s to wound on a single unit can really wrack up some serious damage on unit such as Deathshroud sweeping attacks. Additionally, blight racks when paired with the grenade strategem can do some significant damage. Overall, he can really boost damage output on a unit, but his small radius of “6 is why I don’t put him higher. He is good, but at times struggles to make the cut above the 1-3 choices. (Offense)

5) Noxious Blightbringer. Movement is always an issue with DG infantry. Gaining +1 movement can add up during a game. Regrettably his movement aura only gives +1 regardless if you normal move or run. His other auras to impact enemy morale and combat attrition tests really won’t come up as often as you would like with all the armies that ignore modifiers. If you wanted to build around this it could be very good against some opponents. (Utility)