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So far I've been more of a Warhammer collector more than player but I'd finally like to get together a playable army and start my conquests. Chaos Daemons have been on my mind for a while now. I love their fluff, I love their variety, I love their looks. I've read a bit about them, how units work etc. but it's all strict theory. So far I managed to get 22 Bloodletters and a Bloodthirster for a fraction of the price. I guess that makes my army about 500 pts. I'd like to get to about a 1000 and get into practice battles. My question is - what should I get next? I like the idea of a single-god fluffy army but then again chaos undivided would add lots of variety to both the looks and the playstyle of my army.

On a final note - by no means would I like to have an 'elitist' army. I just want to avoid unplayable units so that I can have a fair chance against others.

Also: Blood for the blood god!

Khorne is awesome and has some great units, but they really lack the shooting that Tzeentch and Nurgle can pull off.

Unless you go with a Soul Grinder and the Phlegm gun.

But if you want to focus on Khorne I would also get some Flesh Hounds! a bunch of them. They are super fast, really tough, and can bring down or at least tie up almost anything in combat.

The Soul Grinder will be able to shoot blasts from afar and is also super tough, and if it gets in to combat, then whatever it is up against is going down.

For shooting and psychic powers, that will really make your army good, look to Tzeentch. Daemon Princes, Fateweaver, Pink Horrors.

Or for some more fun if you are just going solo Khorne get the Skull Cannon.

Khorne Daemons are probably what struggle the most in the book. If you're really into a monogod army, I would consider adding some Khorne CSM to your army. Khorne Berzerkers in Land Raiders are great, and CSM can cover some of the weaknesses Khorne Daemons have. If you want to run undivided, I would recommend some Slaanesh Daemons for fast attacking or some Psychic Tzeentch Daemons for some long range or quick movement.

So from what I've gathered from your replies a Soul Grinder and a box of Pink Horrors won't be a waste? That would get me up to 800-900 points and start my journey and after that I'd purchase what I feel is needed on the go

That could be a fun list. But if you come up against someone with some flyers you will be in some trouble.

If you get the Pink Horrors make sure to upgrade one to a herald. Or get that Pink Horror chariot and use the herald from that kit.

Standout units imo:

HQ: Lord of Change - Solid Stats all round and comes as a Level 2 Psyker stock. Make it a Level 3 Psyker and give it two rolls on the Greater Rewards and 1 Lesser. Make the Lesser the Staff of Change (+2S) and hopefully pick up some good defensive Greater Rewards and you have a really good allrounder. It can do Summoning, Magical Shooting, Divination Buffing or Assaulting. Oddly enough, due to the +2S Staff and Psychic Support they are often significantly better than Bloodthirsters in Close Combat.

Demon Princes - Very Good all round, but can get expensive. They get access to Malefic, Biomancy, Divination and Telepathy which are easily the 4 best disciplines so they make really good Psykers. A Demon Prince that manages to get say Iron Arm and Invisibility off is going to destroy everything in Close Combat. Even though Flying Monstrous Creatures got a little bit of a nerf-bat in 7th, I'd still take Wings on them just so you can move 12" on the ground instead of 6. Plus you don't actually have to be flying to Jink which is nice (Demon Princes of Nurgle, or Tzeentch/Slaanesh Princes that cast the Shrouding psychic power from Telepathy, will have a 2+ Cover save when they Jink...). Flying Slaanesh Princes with a Lash of Despair (Greater Reward) are probably your 'best' anti-air choice, especially if they have Iron Arm too.

Khorne Herald on Juggernaut - take one with a lesser reward (for an AP2 Axe of Khorne) and an Exalted Locus (grants Hatred) if you are running Fleshhounds.

Heralds of Tzeentch - Put them on Discs for really mobile level 3 Psykers that can dart around either buffing your units with Divination/Malefic or Summoning units right where you need them. Cursed Earth (Malefic Pyschic power) is really handy on these guys if they're on a disc, because they're mobile enough to get the +1 Invul save bubble to where you need it. Don't forget Jetbikes can turbo-boost 24" in the shooting phase for even more movement (ie you can move these guys 36" in one phase with no downsides since doing stuff in the Psychic Phase doesn't prevent you from Turbo-boosting in the Shooting phase. Really handy to remember so you can get your Cursed Earth bubble exactly where you need it and/or also getting the Herald in to a nice hiding spot for your opponents turn).

Heralds of Slaanesh - can work well in units of Demonettes or Seekers since they are pretty good at combat and can lend Psychic support. If you give them an Exalted Locus it allows the unit they are in to re-roll misses, which is insane given the number of attacks Demonettes/Seekers throw out. Slaanesh Psykers get access to Telepathy which means you have a shot at getting Invisibility on them! And Psychic Shriek is probably one of the best Primaris Powers anyway if you miss out on Invisibility.

Troops: Demonettes - these girls are vicious, with 3 WS5 rending attacks on the charge at I5. They make mince-meat of both Marine Equivalent and Terminator Equivalent too. Not only that but they get Fleet and +D3" when they run, meaning they work good at running across the board or spreading out/running to cover when you deep strike them. All this for 9points per model. Bloodletters definitely pale in comparison, since they are more expensive, have less attacks, less movement and no way to get through 2+ armour.

Pink Horrors - great for building up your warp-charge. Their psychic shooting got nerfed with 7th Edition since it is harder to get spells off (and makes the Warpflame rule more harsh since you now can't use regular shooting to help finish a unit off before you potentially give them Feel No Pain...), but since they now get the Tzeentch Primaris spell for free you can roll them on Malefic and use them to summon. Be careful with their shooting though, since Flickering Fire of Tzeentch is superb at handing out Feel No Pain to your enemy. Either target very weak units or go all out and focus fire on one unit so it is killed off by the end of the psychic phase to avoid this.

Nurglings - Infiltrate them onto objectives in ruins for a 2+ Cover save and make your opponent waste time removing them. As long as your opponent doesn't have a heap of Ignores Cover or Template weapons lol.

Fast Attack:
Flesh Hounds are definitely under-costed for what they bring, so don't be afraid to grab alot of them (do not buy the Resin models that GW try to flog off on you, instead get the plastic Chaos Warhounds in the Warriors of Chaos Fantasy section. You get twice the models for half the price, and they look just as fitting imo). They have enough WS5 attacks that are S5 on the charge to make MEQ wish they stayed at home, but probably don't send them against TEQ because Fleshounds have no AP. You'll almost certainly want to take a Khorne Herald on a Juggernaut to run with these guys. Buy the Exalted Locus for the Herald which gives Hatred, and these dogs will be truly nasty on the turn they charge.

Seekers of Slaanesh are Demonettes on mounts with an extra attack for 3 points more. Take everything that is good about Demonettes, make them move 12", gain Outflank/Acute Senses and add another attack. Very solid choice.

Screamers of Tzeentch are jetbikes that can fly over units and slash attack them in the movement phase (D3 attacks for each Screamer model that passed over the unit), and can substitute their normal attacks in CC for a S5 Armour-bane attack. They probably won't be taking out Imperial Knights, but other Vehicles shouldn't be a problem. These (and Fleshhounds, which are S5 on the charge so will usually not have any problems with rear armour on non-walker vehicles) are your general Anti-Armour solutions.

Elites: None. They are all over-priced, and don't do anything particularly amazing that you can't do elsewhere. You can probably use the models to Summon in, but even then you're generally better of summoning Demonettes.

Heavy Support - Soul Grinders. AV13 walkers are tough nuts to crack, especially when they have a 5+ invulnerable save because they're a Demon. They come with an Autocannon equivalent that can also Skyfire, and you can upgrade them with a S6 AP4 Torrent Flamer or a Battlecannon equivalent. I'd recommend either giving them Mark of Nurgle, parking it behind cover for a +2 cover save and shooting large blasts around (kindy pricey) or Mark of Tzeentch/Slaanesh and the Torrent Flamer and march it across the board and into assault (my preferred way).

Demon Princes - same as HQ choices, but you can only take them in Heavy Support if you a Greater Demon of the same alignment as a HQ choice.

Skullcannons - Certainly not as all round good as Soul Grinders or Demon Princes but I personally like them. S8 Ignores Cover Large Blast is nothing to sneeze at, even if its only AP5 (though Guard, Ork and Dark Eldar players will definitely not be sneezing at them). Hilariously enough they're also pretty good in CC, especially against non-walker vehicles since they have D6 S7 Hammer of Wrath hits. Only AV12 means they are somewhat easy to take out though.

Herald on a Juggernaut and Flesh Hounds are both great Khorne units.

ryuken87 wrote:
Herald on a Juggernaut and Flesh Hounds are both great Khorne units.

They're also the only great khorne units.

I am of the opposite opinion. Yes, Khorne armies are limited and don't really do as well on the battle field. OTOH, everyone I know who plays them loves them. Removing squad after squad of bloodletters is just part of the game. When Bloodthirsters actually do get into cc they wreck face.

Go with what you love.

I get what you mean techsoldaten. You gotta like what you see to enjoy your army.

Thank you all for your tips, I'll be sure to take every one of them into consideration.

If you're going to get a Skull Cannon, be sure to hack the front half off and replace it with a Juggernaut, like this or as someone says here "You can leave out the entire front section and replace with a Juggy without any special converting or alteration."

Ya know, just 'cos when you put a monstrosity on the table you want people to fear it, not laugh. ;-)

If you want something effective, get Be'lakor The Dark Master.

He automatically knows Invisibility, which makes him take hits on 6's in melee and Snap Shots against shooting. He has a 2+ Jink save, and melee stats so great he can take on pretty much anything in the game.

A friend of mine calculated it takes 180 S5 hits on average to kill him in melee. S8 and upwards requires 42 hits. But that´s when he doesn´t have his 2+ Jink, I guess you can add zeroes after the numbers or something for that.

I guess an Imperial Knight can have a decent chance of killing him, outside that there´s not many others. Don´t think I´ve seen a game where he hasn´t maimed his points costs worth of enemy units.

Original Question: How do I get into Daemons?

Answer: Usually Daemons are trying to get into you for possession purposes. Maybe reverse the ritual and read it backwards

 RunicFIN wrote:
If you want something effective, get Be'lakor The Dark Master.

He automatically knows Invisibility, which makes him take hits on 6's in melee and Snap Shots against shooting. He has a 2+ Jink save, and melee stats so great he can take on pretty much anything in the game.

A friend of mine calculated it takes 180 S5 hits on average to kill him in melee. S8 and upwards requires 42 hits. But that´s when he doesn´t have his 2+ Jink, I guess you can add zeroes after the numbers or something for that.

I guess an Imperial Knight can have a decent chance of killing him, outside that there´s not many others. Don´t think I´ve seen a game where he hasn´t maimed his points costs worth of enemy units.

I played against Tau yesterday, and Be'lakor managed to soak 2000pts worth of tau shooting before he fell. Extremely survivable unit and he does a whole hell of a lot for your army. Plus, he's a cool model

There is nothing truly bad in the daemon codex except the slaanesh chariots and bloodletters. Everything else is ok to great. The only caveat is that daemons work best in large units, 8 fleshhounds, aren't going to do anything useful, 20 with a herald can take out entire armies.

xera32 wrote:
There is nothing truly bad in the daemon codex except the slaanesh chariots and bloodletters. Everything else is ok to great. The only caveat is that daemons work best in large units, 8 fleshhounds, aren't going to do anything useful, 20 with a herald can take out entire armies.

Actually, take a Slaany Herald w/Lesser Locus of Grace on an Exalted Chariot, give her Psy Shriek & Summoning for her spells & an Etherblade and have her trash the enemy's flank...

Hell, if you can put Invis up on her, you can go ahead an throw her into combat and enjoy that tasty 4D6/Rending HoW hits on top of her own ap2 attacks.
And since 7th fixed chariots to actually work properly, her Locus allows you to ignore the negatives of terrain!

Sure it's not a super competitive unit, but the model is freaking gorgeous, and it's a fun model to play that will surprise opponent if you use it well.

Experiment 626 wrote:

xera32 wrote:
There is nothing truly bad in the daemon codex except the slaanesh chariots and bloodletters. Everything else is ok to great. The only caveat is that daemons work best in large units, 8 fleshhounds, aren't going to do anything useful, 20 with a herald can take out entire armies.

Actually, take a Slaany Herald w/Lesser Locus of Grace on an Exalted Chariot, give her Psy Shriek & Summoning for her spells & an Etherblade and have her trash the enemy's flank...

Hell, if you can put Invis up on her, you can go ahead an throw her into combat and enjoy that tasty 4D6/Rending HoW hits on top of her own ap2 attacks.
And since 7th fixed chariots to actually work properly, her Locus allows you to ignore the negatives of terrain!

Sure it's not a super competitive unit, but the model is freaking gorgeous, and it's a fun model to play that will surprise opponent if you use it well.

Agreed. I bought an exalted chariot just to build one since they look so awesome. There was also the time I rolled 11 HoW hits with a regular chariot on a unit of Kroot after making the 10" charge...that was probably a fluke but still hilarious.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
As for what to buy, definitely get a Soul Grinder and a Herald or two. Karanak sees a lot of action in my army, especially with Bloodcrushers. Generic Heralds are my hq of choice.

 trollmeat wrote:
If you're going to get a Skull Cannon, be sure to hack the front half off and replace it with a Juggernaut, like this or as someone says here "You can leave out the entire front section and replace with a Juggy without any special converting or alteration."

Ya know, just 'cos when you put a monstrosity on the table you want people to fear it, not laugh. ;-)

I laughed at that thing just reading about it long before I ever saw it. Whats not funny about firing a laughing skull on fire at high speed at somebody. Proves Khorne's got a wicked sense of humor.
But the Skull Cannon is a solid unit. It ignores cover. Plus I think anything hit by it's blast can be charge by your daemons without an iniative penalty for not having grenades.