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Hey all,

So I've been feeling the call of the flesh-shapers recently and am really interested in swapping my Khorne Daemons for a solo Coven army. It seems like they have the tools to work -- I'd likely sprinkle in other non-Kabal, non-Wych Cult stuff like Scourges, Mandrakes and beasts for taste. But, I've never played DE before and am interested to hear from those with experience to see what they think of the idea.

I think it'd be fun and fluffy especially since the events of the Gathering Storm, but not sure if it'd be well-rounded enough to function.

IMPORTANT CAVEAT: I'm really a casual player and while I'd like the army to stand a chance against someone's practice tourney list, I am not aiming for ITC fame with this idea, just a fun second army to play that won't get stomped.

Coven is great for casual games, not really for GT, but they do work great in ITC rules format, just not for competitive play.

But if you take Eldar or DE as backup for what they are lacking you should do fine.

They currently are a bit over costed, especially the Cronos and Talos, wracks 5mans are good and Grotesques are as well, tho Grotesques IMO are a bit weak on the amount of attacks, they really need 1-2 more attacks per.

Haemonculus are really good.

Pro's:
Strong Melee
High Toughness
Everything can have flamers if you wanted

Cons:
Short range
Lacks Anti-Tank

If you wanted to be more competitive then you will want to take some units from DE or Eldar for sure, like Fire Dragons, Dark Reapers, Ravagers, Void Bomber or Eldar Fliers as back up.

Coven stuff are decent, some of them at least. You won't win a tournament with them but honestly tournaments lists suck, they're extremely boring to play and to play against and each army has only 1-2 way of playing at those iper competitive levels.

With the coven stuff you can certainly play at semi-competitive levels as the haemonculi and grotesques are solid options while talos can be decent but they're not the monsters they were in 7th edition. I don't like wracks but they have their usage and cronos look almost useless at the moment.

Pure coven lists are hard to play though since they completely lack the anti tank. But if you combine them with DE flyers or ravagers you can build a decent list, and coven units IMHO are a lot of fun to play.

This might be a bit of topic, but does the haemonculy transports stil get T6 if they are within the aura?

 Niiai wrote:
This might be a bit of topic, but does the haemonculy transports stil get T6 if they are within the aura?

Venoms and raiders can have the coven keyword so yes, the haemonculi can buff their toughness as well. But auras work only if characters are not embarked, if he's on a transport he couldn't buff vehicles' toughness.

 Blackie wrote:
Coven stuff are decent, some of them at least. You won't win a tournament with them but honestly tournaments lists suck, they're extremely boring to play and to play against and each army has only 1-2 way of playing at those iper competitive levels.

With the coven stuff you can certainly play at semi-competitive levels as the haemonculi and grotesques are solid options while talos can be decent but they're not the monsters they were in 7th edition. I don't like wracks but they have their usage and cronos look almost useless at the moment.

Pure coven lists are hard to play though since they completely lack the anti tank. But if you combine them with DE flyers or ravagers you can build a decent list, and coven units IMHO are a lot of fun to play.

Yeah I was planning on equipping at least some Talos with heat lances and using a couple units of suicide scourges for tank-popping (since they're not Kabal or Wych Cult, and they do get their wings from haemonculi so, hey, I think it's still fluffy).

With the way PfP works now, it seems like the name of the game is: Turn 1- Survive, hide, move up. Turn 2- Charge and let all of the squishy units show up or come out of transports at once so the opponent can't kill them all. Turn 3- Begin transitioning to secondary targets and if the scourge didn't do their job I should at least be in range to engage tanks and other big shooty stuff in combat which will keep them from being able shoot me off the board. Turns 4-5 - Keep blending and hope some Raiders and Scourge are still alive to hop on objectives.

 TheNightWillEnd wrote:

 Blackie wrote:
Coven stuff are decent, some of them at least. You won't win a tournament with them but honestly tournaments lists suck, they're extremely boring to play and to play against and each army has only 1-2 way of playing at those iper competitive levels.

With the coven stuff you can certainly play at semi-competitive levels as the haemonculi and grotesques are solid options while talos can be decent but they're not the monsters they were in 7th edition. I don't like wracks but they have their usage and cronos look almost useless at the moment.

Pure coven lists are hard to play though since they completely lack the anti tank. But if you combine them with DE flyers or ravagers you can build a decent list, and coven units IMHO are a lot of fun to play.

Yeah I was planning on equipping at least some Talos with heat lances and using a couple units of suicide scourges for tank-popping (since they're not Kabal or Wych Cult, and they do get their wings from haemonculi so, hey, I think it's still fluffy).

With the way PfP works now, it seems like the name of the game is: Turn 1- Survive, hide, move up. Turn 2- Charge and let all of the squishy units show up or come out of transports at once so the opponent can't kill them all. Turn 3- Begin transitioning to secondary targets and if the scourge didn't do their job I should at least be in range to engage tanks and other big shooty stuff in combat which will keep them from being able shoot me off the board. Turns 4-5 - Keep blending and hope some Raiders and Scourge are still alive to hop on objectives.

ABout DE and PFP / turns... DE work best as a shooting AND melee army. You really want to hit hard with shooting turns 1 and 2, then turns 3 and 4 your heavy melee units and finally clean up with everything meleeing turns 5-6

But Coven are a bit different, unless you are spamming Tantalus, they need to hit very hard turns 2, 3 and 4, with vehicles low and models foot slugging you wont do much turns 5 and 6.

Edit: There is however late game Coven play tactics, im just saying as a close range slow moving army, you need 1-2 good rounds to secure a victory "easier"