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I know death guard are a tough infantry army with lots of terminators and dreadnoughts, which sounds right up my alley as a necron player. My plan to start was get two betrayal at calth boxes, and to grab the age of darkness collection from black library (which has both of the base books). So 60 marines, 10 termies, 2 dreads, and 4 probably useful HQ. Of course I don't know what I don't know, so I guess my question is, is this a good start for a death guard army? Any tips for how I should build them (since I know there are lots of options and such).

You have a solid collection there. Bare in mind that normal tactical squads do not get to take any special or heavy weapons, so it's bolters with the option of a CCW at 2ppm.

Read up on the Age of Darkness FOC, as it's different from the 40K standard one. You have 2 types of Troops, compulsory (read you need 2 of these) and non-compulsory (fills a troop slot and scores but does not count towards your 2 compulsory slots). Then there's different ways to change what is/isn't a compulsory Troop such as special characters, rights of war, etc.

DG can take chemical munitions for their flame weapons to basically give them shred but also "gets hot" which is really powerful. Consider taking this on a veteran tactical squad rocking 2 heavy flamers (and some combi flamers for good measure) and giving them the Marksman ability, which grants outflank and sniper (so rending on those shredding flamers)

HOOOOOOOO BOY! LETS DIVE IN!

OKAY, so, first and foremost, DG have quite a few super fluffy ways to build them up:

Infantry spam: LOTS of tactical marines, with LOTS of apothecaries, and LOTS of support/heavy support marines. This is SUPER fluffy, and with the right kit, works really well. ALWAYS give extra CCWs (a huge part of the DG battle doctrine was being well equipped to do basically anything)
terminator spam: we had the most cataphractii, and both of out legion special units are in terminator armour (and are damn amazing) with unlimited points, we can bring ~163 terminators
deadnought spam: Morty loves his dreadnoughts, and he saw them as the perfect infantry, spam 'em for a good laugh.
chem spam: CHem flamers, phosphex, and heavy artillery are all fluffy for DG.

Our grave wardens are arguably the best unit in the game (amazing gun, take away charge bonuses, cataphractii armour, can over watch with the deathcloud, same price as regular terminators), and the deathshoud are one of the better beatstick squads in the game.
our rights of war let you spam rad grenades or give everyone stealth from a distance, which is cool.
Morty is an amazing primarch who hits hard, hugely buffs our army, and is the fastest primarch (6" move, 10" warp and can charge afterwards) and one of the shootiest (great pistol, unlimited long range phosphex bombs)
one of the single most fluffy units for the DG are a 20-man tac squad with extra CCWs and an apothecary (21 being a multiple of 7 and what not)


as for how you should start out:
1) the first and most important thing with 30k is that basically every option is good and has a use. in my oppinion there is a single "bad" thing in the entire list, and that's rotor cannons, they make me weep :(
2) with 2 BaC you're at a cool spot. (though, if you have the funds, go for a prospero box since DG LOVED MK III armour) something like this as a core start with let you expand a lot of directions and be fun to play as DG:

1 praetor (any HQ model, though if you could find a way to give him a paragon blade, thats probably best. I run mine with fist + blade in artificer armour)
2 Centurions of any kind (the "chaplain" from calth can be anything, he is in no way modeled to ONLY be a chaplain, same goes for the terminator praetor)

2 20-man tactical squads w/ extra CCWs and Artificer on the Srgt.
1 5-man flamer support squad

1 10-man cataphractii squad w/ fists and combi-bolters. I give mine flamers for fluff, since you can't over watch
contemptor dreadnought w/ kehres + fist (you COULD build one as dual kheres, and then dual fists if you had the patience)
contemptor dreadnought w/ kehres + fist

1 5-man missile launcher heavy support squad


this is a solid core to expand from, and leaves you with 10 men to make apothecaries, vets, or anything else

You can convert the apostle from BaC into a fist/paragon blade Praetor pretty easily.

So with a fairly minimal additions, a 2k list along the lines of:

+ HQ (160pts) +

····Legion Praetor (160pts) [Cataphractii Terminator Armour with Combi-bolter and Power Weapon, Chainfist, Rad Grenades]

+ Elites (805pts) +

····Apothecarion Detachment (110pts)
······Legion Apothecary [Rad Grenades]
········Additional Wargear [Chainsword/Combat Blade]
······Legion Apothecary [Rad Grenades]
········Additional Wargear [Chainsword/Combat Blade]

····Contemptor Dreadnought Talon (380pts)
······Legion Contemptor Dreadnought [Kheres Pattern Assault Cannon]
······Legion Contemptor Dreadnought [Kheres Pattern Assault Cannon]

····Legion Terminator Squad (315pts) [Cataphractii Terminator Armour with Combi-bolter and Power Weapon, 7x Legion Terminators, 7x Power Fist]
······Legion Terminator Sergeant [Power Fist, Rad Grenades]

+ Troops (825pts) +

····Legion Heavy Support Squad (135pts) [Chem-munitions, Heavy Flamers, 4x Legion Space Marines]

····Legion Heavy Support Squad (160pts) [4x Legion Space Marines, Missile Launchers]

····Legion Tactical Squad (265pts) [19x Legion Tactical Space Marines]
······Additional Wargear [Additional Chainswords/Combat Blades, Bolters]
······Legion Tactical Sergeant [Bolter, Chainsword/Combat Blade]

····Legion Tactical Squad (265pts) [19x Legion Tactical Space Marines]
······Additional Wargear [Additional Chainswords/Combat Blades, Bolters]
······Legion Tactical Sergeant [Bolter, Chainsword/Combat Blade]

+ Heavy Support (210pts) +

····Grave Warden Terminator Squad (210pts) [4x Grave Warden Terminator]
······Chem-master [Rad Grenades]

+ Legion +

····Legiones Astartes [ XIV: Death Guard, Traitor]

····Rite of War [The Reaping]

+ Force Organization +

····Force Organization
······Battles in the Age of Darkness [ Age of Darkness Primary Detachment]

Created with BattleScribe

The apothecaries join the tac squads, and praetor joins terminator squad, outside of that everything else is fairly straight forward. March across the board, use numbers and rad grenades to take down dedicated assault units, and assault when in range.

Looks good. I would suggest maybe not taking power fists on every terminator. Two chain-fists, maybe two pairs of lightning claws and leave the others with power weapons. This means they're flexible (from what I understand a very DG thing) and saves you points for other things. Also, try and get a paragon blade on your praetor, it's pretty much the best weapon for them.

The problem with doing that with Terminators is it makes them TO varied. almost all the time: if you are using your fists, your claws are wasted, and if you're using your claws, your fists are over kill. it's the same idea as a 40k dev. squad with 2 heavy bolters, and 2 las cannons: almost all the time, half of your loadout will be wasted.

I DO agree with the paragon blade. I like running my praetor w/ the digital weapon (an extra attack) a paragon blade and a power fist (both are specialist weapons) on artificer armour with a halo. this nets you more attacks, and the same durability.


As for your list:

Like Snykyninja mentioned, a paragon blade would be really good. this isn't to hard since a paragon blade is technically anything (i.e. a fancy chain fist )

the apothecaries look fine. I like giving mine Artificer armour and augury scanners. Since they have a srgt. stat line, this means you can run your AA srgt. near the front to tank AP: 3 shots. the Augury scanner helps because getting interceptor on a 20-man tactical squad if the enemy lands close enough is funny.
you WILL run into a bit of an issue with the contemptors as they are rather massive point sinks :(
8 terminators seems like a weird number, but I would give 1 or 2 chain fists, and 1/2 of them heavy flamers for DG fluff reasons.

much like the apothecaries, Artificer armour on the srgt. is HUGE and AWESOME. Additionally, a vexillia will help prevent you from booking it, and a vox (if you can get some) help with barrage and deep strikers (if you ever intend to use those things)
the Heavy Support squads look good, just aim to eventually get them to 10-man squads. MAYBE a rhino for the heavy flamers?

decent loadout on the grave wardens, I run 2/10 chainfists.


beyond those things, it looks decent enough to expand from. Although I would actually aim for 2,500 since that's more of the "30k standard"

Welcome to the legion, brother. Count the Seven and what-not