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I'm not a power gamer looking for a super competitive list, but I do want to know if I will get laughed out of the club for bringing a defiler, is there any reasonable (not super competitive, I'm a friendly gamer) to run them?

They can look awesome, surely that is good enough (and it does have a battlecannon...)

When I use to play my chaos i would run my defiler purely for CC. I would shoot that battle cannon until the thing was destroyed. If the battle cannon was destroyed then I ran it into combat.

Looking awesome is the reason I want one.
Who doesn.t love a gaint spider robot thing with a cannon in it's chest!

It tries to cover a selection of mutually-exclusive roles and excels at none of them, resulting in a bloated 200pt AV12 walker with no real job to do.

The Battle Cannon is the obvious wonder here, except it's Ordnance. Firing the Cannon results in Snapfires for all your other weaponry and makes the Havoc Launcher completely redundant since it can never shoot unless the Battle Cannon is destroyed. Therefore, the obvious conclusion is to swap them for Powerfists and run into assault while launching shells.

Except if you are using the Battle Cannon, you aren't running. If you aren't running, Fleet is useless. You are stuck either paying for a 200pt Battle Cannon to waddle its way upfield at 6" a turn, or you are paying 200pts for 6 WS3 Power Fist attacks on a semi-mobile platform with no firepower.

Even if it makes combat, those 6 attacks are great until you see WS3/I3. Krak grenades are going first and have the potential to hurt because you're only AV12. Any other walker or MC will also be nasty: MCs have the stats to survive your attacks, Walkers tend to go first. Either is perfectly capable of mashing your WS3/AV12 frame into a little cube.

- Mutually exclusive roles of either combat or shooting a Battle Cannon
- If shooting, you're*only* shooting the Cannon because snapfire is horrible
- If assaulting, you aren't using the cannon
- Realistically limited to killing infantry since MCs beat you, faster elements can avoid you and TEQs will murder you
- All of the above comes in at 200pts and AV12

The Battle Cannon is nice, but it's much nicer on an AV14 Russ with more guns at 75% the cost.
The number of attacks are nice, except you'd get far more from a similarly costed unit. Examples in this price range include the Keeper of Secrets and Terminators.
The speed is alright, but using it will cost you the Battle Cannon.

It's actually pretty poor, your better with the dinobots. Defiler's just get so easily shot down due to its rules and armour.

If you like big mean looking walkers then I can only recommend skipping the Defiler entirely and instead allying in a Soul grinder. The soul grinder is cheaper and just all around better than the Defiler.

My friend brings one to the table because his looks pretty nifty, and it has never failed to disappoint. IE it always performs disappointingly.

Every time it dies he goes "I shouldn't be disappointed in him anymore, I should be expecting this but... come on, Defiler. Don't be like that."

because of the battle cannon, it needs to be shot down, so in theory it draws fire away from other units. But it's much too easy to shoot down and costs way too much for that job.

That is very disappointing...

They were barely worth 150 points in 5th edition. In 6th they sure as hell are NOT worth 200 points. At AV 13/12/12 they might be worth 175.

I used to run the Defiler quite a bit.

It is surprisingly tough with 4HP and a 5++ save from it being a daemon. Plus it has IWND, so it has the potential to regenerate wounds.

However, the Defiler is completely schizophrenic as it tries to complete two completely different roles. On one hand it is trying to be an artillery piece by walking around with a battlecannon, on the other it is completely covered with powerfists.

But because of this, it fails to do either job well. It is too slow to be an assault platform (The maulerfield is quicker) and besides the battlecannon it doesn't really have any other weapons due to the fact that it is an ordinance weapon (whereas the forgefield can have three blast weapons) all of this for 200pts.

Not to mention that the model itself is really really big. It is nearly impossible to hide anyone sucessfully.

The Maulerfiend is the same speed on open ground and that 3x template Forgefiend has less HP and takes an average of 1HP damage every 2 turns to overheating. The Defiler is hamstrung by trying to fill several roles but being mediocre in each, whereas the Forgefiend/Maulerfiend try to specialise in one, and yet are still mediocre.

Look at the Soul Grinder... and cry.

its an infantry support vehicle. i don't think its ever been designed as anything else in this edition. I usually just put a dirge caster on it and it typically pops a transport or two, is a good counter attacking unit if my lines are threatened, or you can potentially infiltrate it (with the right warlord trait) and it becomes a turn 2 threat to most units. don't expect it to do things it shouldn't do. for 200 pts these days most armies can't even field a good CC HQ choice. Leave poor deffy be, he's an all-rounder not a precision strike.

You can only infiltrate infantry with "Master of Deception".

And I don't think the Defiler moves as fast as the Maulerfiend. That thing covers some serious ground.

 Eldarain wrote:
You can only infiltrate infantry with "Master of Deception".

And I don't think the Defiler moves as fast as the Maulerfiend. That thing covers some serious ground.

Both have fleet, only difference is Maulerfiend has move through cover.

Meh, what else are you gonna use to reach out and touch someone in our codex?

Just plunk Deffy down on your back-line and drop pie plates on everyone. Laugh maniacally when you regain that lost hull point at the end of your turn. Deffy too big to get into cover? Well then! Use Deffy as cover! Chuckle grimly as your opponent tries to draw LOS through a powerfist. Worried about spending too many points on one unit? Move on then sucka cuz Warhammer ain't for you.

MarsNZ wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
You can only infiltrate infantry with "Master of Deception".

And I don't think the Defiler moves as fast as the Maulerfiend. That thing covers some serious ground.

Both have fleet, only difference is Maulerfiend has move through cover.

"Siege crawler" gives it a 12" move.

Hey and doesn't the Ordnance thing not apply because the Defiler is a heavy walker? I thought there was something in there about that...

Mozzamanx got most of it. The thing is a jack-of-all-trades, but master of none, with lots of useful but mutually exclusive ability, and while being priced as though it were better than it were with all of them and able to use them all at the same time. All that and with relatively weak survivability, and for some inexplicable reason had its price *increased* last time around...

 Eldarain wrote:

MarsNZ wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
You can only infiltrate infantry with "Master of Deception".

And I don't think the Defiler moves as fast as the Maulerfiend. That thing covers some serious ground.

Both have fleet, only difference is Maulerfiend has move through cover.

"Siege crawler" gives it a 12" move.

Forgot about that, Maulerfiend is still a joke at assaulting, and has no guns. Seems like a joke unit with a slightly less funny punchline than Mutilators.

We talking about the same Maulerfiend? It's cheap and hits with a lot of S10 AP2 hits and a few S8 AP1 armorbane hits. Wrecks fortifications, which I think there was an entire book about recently.

2A base, WS3, not really hitting 'a lot'. Deffy has more attacks.

I think it's an awsome model and have personally ttried using it a lot but by now it's been named "the Unlucky one" because whenever I field him he get's blown up on the first or second turn without having done a thing. I have had some success with using it as either an allied soul grinder or a plague hulk.

Well I am not a competitive gamer so I might just get one sometime, (it is really cool)
and it might have value as an ordnance platform that can defend itself in melee if it is charged. hmm...

Awesome model. Used it in 5th a lot.

It was expensive at 150 points. I expected it to go cheaper. Now it is a "never take" unit. A pity.

I have had some success with the Defiler in 6th edition. Usually just with the battlecannon, it's still nice to be able to use artillery in a CSM army.

As other posters have said, the Forgefiend is slightly better for what you get. I can typically do more with the autocannon shots than I can a pie-plate from the Defiler.

With Tyrannids coming out, I see a resurgence for the Defiler on the way. The battlecannon is just essential for taking out swarms from range.

Is the defiler worth it?
Hilariously no.

The defiler is arguably better than the maulerfiend in CQB, however the problem is (as with all CC options in the codex) how are going to relably get into combat. The Maulerfiend can easily achieve 2nd turn charges. If the defiler was running flat out or was in close combat, its not using that big expensive gun that you paid for. If its sitting back and shooting, its not using those big expensive powe fists you paid for.

it might be fun in a list with a lot of other armor, so your opponent is forced to make tough choices. I plan to run a defiler in a list with a pair of vindicators and three rhinos. if deffy is the only armor on the table, he's going to be a fire magnet. but, with a pair of vindicators and a pile of transports rolling into your face, deffy is probably going to be low on your target priority list for the first couple turns...