Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So I'm thinking something along these lines:

Lord of contagion, plaguecaster, Mortarion, 3 units of plague marines with blight launchers, some Deathshroud, a couple of PBC, and then use a patrol detachment with the new herald that helps plaguebearers and a blob of plaguebearers.

Use all my CP's to teleport the plaguebearers, herald and Morty alongside his Deathshroud while the marines cap objectives and the PBC shoot tanks and cover the melee assault

Please provide your own math on how predators are better than PBC.

Calling the argument bad does not disprove it. While I'm willing to believe you, you have provided no proof for your claims yet.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Tiberius501 wrote:
So I'm thinking something along these lines:

Lord of contagion, plaguecaster, Mortarion, 3 units of plague marines with blight launchers, some Deathshroud, a couple of PBC, and then use a patrol detachment with the new herald that helps plaguebearers and a blob of plaguebearers.

Use all my CP's to teleport the plaguebearers, herald and Morty alongside his Deathshroud while the marines cap objectives and the PBC shoot tanks and cover the melee assault

You could also add a second Codexaemon character to make his locus buff the PBC with +1 damage.

I'm participating in a friendly 1000 pt tournament with some friends. Most are new to the game including myself and I was having trouble deciding on a list to run. I'll be facing a variety of armies (Tau, Necron, Ork, Dark Angels, Thousand Sons, Admech, Eldar). List rules were relics, warlord traits and psychic powers can change between games and no LOW. Here are the 2 lists I'm considering on running. Any suggestions are welcome.

The second list is significantly better imo. A good starting point for a DG list is cultists/poxwalkers for screening and anti infantry, bloat drones with plague spitters for better anti infantry and mobility, and PBCs with entropy for anti tank.

Personally, I'd consider whether you are better served with the plague caster or running a demon prince for casting and melee carnage. Running a third set of cultists over PM might free those points up. Depends how you want to use them, more about preference than sheer power but I felt I needed to offer at least some sort of constructive criticism lol.

This needs repeating but pbcs just do not do well with plaguespitters. Moving makes their main weapon all but useless, and they don't work as well as drones do at short range in any case. Specialization always beats generalization.

SilverAlien wrote:
The second list is significantly better imo. A good starting point for a DG list is cultists/poxwalkers for screening and anti infantry, bloat drones with plague spitters for better anti infantry and mobility, and PBCs with entropy for anti tank.

Personally, I'd consider whether you are better served with the plague caster or running a demon prince for casting and melee carnage. Running a third set of cultists over PM might free those points up. Depends how you want to use them, more about preference than sheer power but I felt I needed to offer at least some sort of constructive criticism lol.

This needs repeating but pbcs just do not do well with plaguespitters. Moving makes their main weapon all but useless, and they don't work as well as drones do at short range in any case. Specialization always beats generalization.

Thanks for the advice
I was thinking of the plague caster to have more flexibility with my psychic powers, although I would only be swapping in Plague Wind for 30 ork boyz blobs. The PMs with blight launchers was to make use of the Arch-Contaminator on the lord.
The DP and FBDs have definitely been MVPs in my earlier games.

 Jidmah wrote:
Please provide your own math on how predators are better than PBC.

Calling the argument bad does not disprove it. While I'm willing to believe you, you have provided no proof for your claims yet.

"How predators are better than PBC" Is a statement that completely misses the forest for the trees. Competitive 40k isn't about building lists around dueling ranged tanks.

Nevertheless, here is a sample of some relevant PBC damage spread comparisons that you can use to draw conclusions: https://imgur.com/a/KoIgU

Of particular note is the absolutely awful performance on the Entropy cannon -2 to hit charts.

This needs repeating but pbcs just do not do well with plaguespitters. Moving makes their main weapon all but useless, and they don't work as well as drones do at short range in any case. Specialization always beats generalization.

This needs repeating but pbcs just do not do well with Entropy cannons. You are better off spending the points on different units entirely because in competitive, PBC with Entropy cannons make your large model a nice looking paperweight that can often be ignored
The main weapon is a nice tool to have (no LOS artillery is clutch in competitive for threatening to deny the ability for otherwise minimal model units to sit on an objective marker behind a building), and if you want that tool, always take 2 plague spitters because they are ridiculously strong weapon profile, and the more you can fit in your army the better.







Automatically Appended Next Post:

ultrapogo wrote:

SilverAlien wrote:
The second list is significantly better imo. A good starting point for a DG list is cultists/poxwalkers for screening and anti infantry, bloat drones with plague spitters for better anti infantry and mobility, and PBCs with entropy for anti tank.

Personally, I'd consider whether you are better served with the plague caster or running a demon prince for casting and melee carnage. Running a third set of cultists over PM might free those points up. Depends how you want to use them, more about preference than sheer power but I felt I needed to offer at least some sort of constructive criticism lol.

This needs repeating but pbcs just do not do well with plaguespitters. Moving makes their main weapon all but useless, and they don't work as well as drones do at short range in any case. Specialization always beats generalization.

Thanks for the advice
I was thinking of the plague caster to have more flexibility with my psychic powers, although I would only be swapping in Plague Wind for 30 ork boyz blobs. The PMs with blight launchers was to make use of the Arch-Contaminator on the lord.
The DP and FBDs have definitely been MVPs in my earlier games.

The first list, if you drop one PBC and take 20 Poxwalkers (and have the models to spawn new poxwalkers), it looks incredibly powerful, much too powerful for a 1000 point 'friendly' tournament.

The second list is a lot friendlier, it will give good games but a lot is riding on the Foetid Bloat Drones, an opponent who can put one or both down in the first turn will have a fairly easy ride against you. Easier said than done in 1k points 'friendly' tournament, but if many other players decide to go not-so-friendly with what they bring, you could struggle.

but why the hell you must take spitters on pbc when you can play foetid bloat drones+pbc...like in the list above.
PS: take down 2 foetid drones 1st turn in 1000pt game? nearly impossible, you cant usually at 2000pts games, you can imagine at 1000pt, i really dont know what kind of warhammer you play.

 blackmage wrote:
but why the hell you must take spitters on pbc when you can play foetid bloat drones+pbc...like in the list above.
PS: take down 2 foetid drones 1st turn in 1000pt game? nearly impossible, you cant usually at 2000pts games, you can imagine at 1000pt, i really dont know what kind of warhammer you play.

I play competitive, lol.

2 first turn in 1000 is admittedly a stretch, but in 2000 is doable.

I take all Spitters on FBD and PBC in the same list. Why would you ever not take Spitters, they are both cheaper and better on PBC than Entropy, especially when you have Arch Contaminator on W/L. Entropy are just that bad for the points on BS4 platform, they need to be 15-20pts for upgrade and then at least it's providing a decision when listbuilding.

Honestly if Spitters weren't an option all things considered as they are now you would be better to take 3 Blight Haulers over 3 PBC with Entropy, sure you lose the Mortar/stubber fire power and comparative toughness but at least 3 Blight Haulers can actually be more reliable in their damage dealing role with their effective +2BS over the PBC.

.... are you actually claiming blight haulers put out more damaged for their cost than PBCs? That's just... /sigh. Blight haulers are notoriously awful damage for cost as anti tank weapons.

I have no idea why you hate entropy cannons on PBCs, but tricked out for anti tank a PBC puts out the same rough damage for cost as a lascannon predator and far more than blight haulers will, unless said hauler manages to sit and fire at 12" multiple turns in a row. Possibly even then as well.

PBC with plaguespitters are either sitting still, meaning too far back to fire plague spitters when entropy cannons could be firing adding more damage, or advancing, which ruins the main weapon's accuracy and puts the PBC at close range where it'll get at most a turn or two of shooting before getting bogged down in melee, a situation where it'll never earn its points back.

I'll do another cost breakdown during lunch comparing them again, just so we can move on.

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:
"How predators are better than PBC" Is a statement that completely misses the forest for the trees. Competitive 40k isn't about building lists around dueling ranged tanks.

And yet you provide data for shooting at tanks...

Nevertheless, here is a sample of some relevant PBC damage spread comparisons that you can use to draw conclusions: https://imgur.com/a/KoIgU

Of particular note is the absolutely awful performance on the Entropy cannon -2 to hit charts.

Your numbers for predator:
No modifier: 5.17
-1 to hit: 3.89
-2 to hit: 2.59

Considering that a quad lascannon predator is 190 and a PBC with entropy cannons is 146, let's normalize those numbers (multiply by PBC cost, divide by predator cost:
No modifier: 3.97
-1 to hit: 2.99
-2 to hit: 1.99


PBC with entropy cannons and heavy stubber (added by me) vs T7:
No modifier: 1.81 + 2.33 + 0.33 = 4.47
-1 to hit: 1.20 + 1.55 + 0.22 = 2.97
-2 to hit: 0.61 + 0.79 + 0.11 = 1.51

PBC with entropy cannons and heavy stubber (mortar and stubber added by me) vs T8:
No modifier: 1.36 + 1.75 + 0.33 = 3.44
-1 to hit: 0.90 + 1.16+ 0.22 = 2.16
-2 to hit: 0.45 + 0.58 + 0.11 = 1.14

So the predator is better against T8 and -2 to hit, but as long as the target is at maximum -1 to hit the PBC will perform the same or better than the predator per point spent. Arch Contaminator works in favor of the PBC, but not massively so.
Standard deviation for PBC is lower, so it is more reliable, but less likely to over perform.
In general, I'd say the models are about even in efficiency unless you are sure to be facing multiple -2 to hit or T8 models that you need to take down.

This needs repeating but pbcs just do not do well with Entropy cannons. You are better off spending the points on different units entirely because in competitive, PBC with Entropy cannons make your large model a nice looking paperweight that can often be ignored
The main weapon is a nice tool to have (no LOS artillery is clutch in competitive for threatening to deny the ability for otherwise minimal model units to sit on an objective marker behind a building), and if you want that tool, always take 2 plague spitters because they are ridiculously strong weapon profile, and the more you can fit in your army the better.

Considering that plague spitters can't shoot on most of your turns, that moving makes both the mortar and the tertiary gun fire at -1 and that entropy cannons are a 6 point upgrade over the cheapest possible PBC, I'd argue that entropy cannons will most likely deal more damage over the course of a game than the two spitters. Even with Arch contaminator, they will outperform spitters if they get three rounds of shooting against a -2 to hit target.

This isn't even really a mathammer question for me, or at least not just a mathammer question (although knowing the numbers is obviously key at any level of competitiveness). The Entropy cannon provides reasonably efficient ranged Anti-tank in a list that has a significant overall lack of ranged anti-tank. The Spitters might be better, as a weapon, from an efficiency standpoint, but the argument here, IMO anyway, is about opportunity cost and efficiency, not just efficiency. Any DG list will have multiple redundancy for the kind of damage Spitters do, but tno so much for the cannon.

if you can put spitters in foetid drones and you play them, i think pbc should be used with entropy cannons, when you really need to hit/damage something you have ways to do that via stratagems.

The game is not only mathhammer. And thats the deal with it.

and trying to make a point here i give 3 pointers.

1) Drones ability to fly = move out of cc and shoot again makes them not only fast but also the best spitters carrier ever we have seen.

2) if you invest a lord with wt reroll wounds 3 pbc + screener its only logical to make the plan for the points you invested making that fire base full of ranged weapons stationary for max output.

3) the only reason i would use spitters on pbc is when you just cant do nothing else. Example the list seen lately with 10 pburstcrawlers yes then id use spitters since you transforming the unit to an all around w/e.

the game is not only math hammer. but also we cant ignore math hammer. You need to adjust all information with a grain of salt heavily defendant on your play style and skill. That said if you makign the fire base then you cant have less than 3 tanks a lord with wtrait and enough screener.

tip: try to math out how many tanks will do the job and how many screeners will also be sufficient thats mroe important questios.Since when you start to invest in a plan you understand easily more will do the job but its hard to find a list balanced to actually perform it.So 3 tanks min if you making a fire base.

Jidmah wrote:
And yet you provide data for shooting at tanks...

Because that's the only thing the Entropy PBC is good for. I'm controlling giving it the best possible chance to 'succeed' in proving it's value. We already know Plague Spitters are an amazing weapon profile, more valuable against a much wider range of targets.

Considering that a quad lascannon predator is 190 and a PBC with entropy cannons is 146, let's normalize those numbers (multiply by PBC cost, divide by predator cost:
Predator
-1 to hit: 2.99
-2 to hit: 1.99


PBC vs T7
-2 to hit: 0.61 + 0.79 + 0.11 = 1.51

PBC vs T8:

-2 to hit: 0.45 + 0.58 + 0.11 = 1.14

Thanks for that. There you go. PBC, even normalized for points is comparatively poor in the role of being a tool for countering bigger models (and bear in mind there needs to be some consideration when normalising to the fact here that you can't 'buy' 1.3 Plague Crawlers instead of a LasPred). The Pred is over 30% better without factoring T8 in which makes PBC even worse.

I include in hightlighting here the -1 for the Predator as well to show an even bigger disparity. Entropy Cannons on the PBC have a horrifically short range for the job which translates into real on-the-table scenarios of having to move in order to bring about their firepower. Comparing both vs T73+ in a situation where the Predator can leverage it's 48" reach and the PBC has to move, the Predator is 100% better for the points.

The Predator on these numbers is clearly a better choice when factoring in the stratagem that removes the penalty for moving and firing, as again, you can't apply the stratagem to 1.3 PBCs.

The simple fact is DG don't make a good 'traditional gunline army' when it comes to heavy firepower against big models. You are far better off playing to the strengths of the codex over forcing square pegs into round holes with the PBC. Sure, its resilient to damage, but it hit's like a wet rag compared to what other books can achieve with similar role models.

Any thoughts on using Las/Missile Helbrute as an anti-armor alternative to Haulers, PBC or Predators?

I play a lot of ITCs and my PBCs all perform very well for me. I always take 3 in my lists with a lord to babysit them. I also take 3 bloat drones as well.

On another note I'm strongly considering adding a herald and Epi in a patrol for the loci and to buff up my daemon engines. Also to deepstrike Morty with the new stratagem.

XShadow wrote:
I play a lot of ITCs and my PBCs all perform very well for me. I always take 3 in my lists with a lord to babysit them. I also take 3 bloat drones as well.

On another note I'm strongly considering adding a herald and Epi in a patrol for the loci and to buff up my daemon engines. Also to deepstrike Morty with the new stratagem.

Yeah but what guns do you use? Spitters or canons?

Dew wrote:

XShadow wrote:
I play a lot of ITCs and my PBCs all perform very well for me. I always take 3 in my lists with a lord to babysit them. I also take 3 bloat drones as well.

On another note I'm strongly considering adding a herald and Epi in a patrol for the loci and to buff up my daemon engines. Also to deepstrike Morty with the new stratagem.

Yeah but what guns do you use? Spitters or canons?

All 3 of mine have entropy cannons.

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:
The simple fact is DG don't make a good 'traditional gunline army' when it comes to heavy firepower against big models. You are far better off playing to the strengths of the codex over forcing square pegs into round holes with the PBC. Sure, its resilient to damage, but it hit's like a wet rag compared to what other books can achieve with similar role models.

I'd argue focusing on units which can outlast the enemy is playing to our army's strength, and PBCs durability allows them to whether a lot more fire than equivalents in other armies. Now, as we see more and more armies get the -1 to ranged shots against them on their tanks (currently just admech and eldar) that may be less true, but currently our tanks are very hard to gun down.

Second, what exactly is our niche if not durability? We are merely okay in melee, and our anti infantry firepower is generally worse than our anti tank. Even drones are only good because of their durability, their firepower is laughable for cost.

SilverAlien wrote:

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:
The simple fact is DG don't make a good 'traditional gunline army' when it comes to heavy firepower against big models. You are far better off playing to the strengths of the codex over forcing square pegs into round holes with the PBC. Sure, its resilient to damage, but it hit's like a wet rag compared to what other books can achieve with similar role models.

I'd argue focusing on units which can outlast the enemy is playing to our army's strength, and PBCs durability allows them to whether a lot more fire than equivalents in other armies. Now, as we see more and more armies get the -1 to ranged shots against them on their tanks (currently just admech and eldar) that may be less true, but currently our tanks are very hard to gun down.

Second, what exactly is our niche if not durability? We are merely okay in melee, and our anti infantry firepower is generally worse than our anti tank. Even drones are only good because of their durability, their firepower is laughable for cost.

We're a durable mid range/brawler army.

I'm not saying don't take PBC. It's certainly a durable option and the no-LOS mortar is a useful tool. Just when you do, for sponson choice take the actually good assault high str reroll wound Heavy Flamers, and not the almost useless Entropy cannons.

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:
We're a durable mid range/brawler army.

I'm not saying don't take PBC. It's certainly a durable option and the no-LOS mortar is a useful tool. Just when you do, for sponson choice take the actually good assault high str reroll wound Heavy Flamers, and not the almost useless Entropy cannons.

This is so idiotic, you are arguing based on the weapon being better with no consideration for how it interacts with the unit or its other weapons. What exactly do you do with this configuration?

If you have it sitting behind a screen, the plague spitters will do literally nothing until late game and only then if your screen buckles.

Advance it up the field? Your main gun is hitting on a 5+ doing less than nothing. You can take a helbrute with mixed loadout (lascannon and scourge) instead, have a 3+ on the move, and be useful consistently at close range not just 1-2 turns. Even better are the FW variants.

If you just want plaguespitters and don't feel the need for the anti tank main gun, then why even use a PBC? Drones do this far better, and honestly a drone in melee with probe is probably on par with a PBC firing main gun alone on a 5+.

Maybe you want a unit with some anti tank that is still useful if the enemy lacks tanks or big things entirely? Demon princes or melee drones are more consistently useful in this role, as would the aforementioned dreadnoughts. In particular look at the butcher cannon or grab bombard options on the FW variants.

PBC with entropy cannons has a role: you sit it behind a screen like you would a predator, a bit further up the field than normal, and trust it's high durability will allow it to tank incoming fire better than a predator would. It trades some damage and range for durability in a long range firefight. May not be a tradeoff everyone wants, but it at least has a purpose.

PBC with plaguespitters lacks any decent role. It's bad for all the same reasons the defiler or soul grinder is bad. Also, if you start arguing those are useful I'm going to laugh in your face.

SilverAlien wrote:

PBC with plaguespitters lacks any decent role. It's bad for all the same reasons the defiler or soul grinder is bad. Also, if you start arguing those are useful I'm going to laugh in your face.

I'd would argue that the Defiler is in a better spot than before, but I agree on the distrust for schizophrenic builds in vehicles.
I will buy for my DG Leviathan, Deredeo, and Contemptors before touching a Defiler.

3 PBC + 3 drones (or 2 drones and one hauler, or something like that) is a 900pts circa core that allows you to build a lot of armies. After the point decrease, one can plan a brigade in 2000 pts that still packs a punch.

 KiloFiX wrote:
Any thoughts on using Las/Missile Helbrute as an anti-armor alternative to Haulers, PBC or Predators?

i was wondering the same thing.

SilverAlien wrote:

Spoiler:

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:
We're a durable mid range/brawler army.

I'm not saying don't take PBC. It's certainly a durable option and the no-LOS mortar is a useful tool. Just when you do, for sponson choice take the actually good assault high str reroll wound Heavy Flamers, and not the almost useless Entropy cannons.

This is so idiotic, you are arguing based on the weapon being better with no consideration for how it interacts with the unit or its other weapons. What exactly do you do with this configuration?

If you have it sitting behind a screen, the plague spitters will do literally nothing until late game and only then if your screen buckles.

Advance it up the field? Your main gun is hitting on a 5+ doing less than nothing. You can take a helbrute with mixed loadout (lascannon and scourge) instead, have a 3+ on the move, and be useful consistently at close range not just 1-2 turns. Even better are the FW variants.

If you just want plaguespitters and don't feel the need for the anti tank main gun, then why even use a PBC? Drones do this far better, and honestly a drone in melee with probe is probably on par with a PBC firing main gun alone on a 5+.

Maybe you want a unit with some anti tank that is still useful if the enemy lacks tanks or big things entirely? Demon princes or melee drones are more consistently useful in this role, as would the aforementioned dreadnoughts. In particular look at the butcher cannon or grab bombard options on the FW variants.

PBC with entropy cannons has a role: you sit it behind a screen like you would a predator, a bit further up the field than normal, and trust it's high durability will allow it to tank incoming fire better than a predator would. It trades some damage and range for durability in a long range firefight. May not be a tradeoff everyone wants, but it at least has a purpose.

PBC with plaguespitters lacks any decent role. It's bad for all the same reasons the defiler or soul grinder is bad. Also, if you start arguing those are useful I'm going to laugh in your face.

Tone down the aggressive ignorance thanks.

On a PBC, the Plague Spitters are the 'main gun'. You can take only Drones if you want, never said not to. But if you don't think, for your plague spitter platform, that +1T, +2W, +1S, a bonus Heavy Mortar weapon and an extra 18 points up your sleeve vs +1M and FLY is a legitimate list building consideration for competitive then just stop replying to this topic and save yourself the blood pressure.

Your 'decent role/schizophrenic' argument is irrelevant rhetoric because we aren't discussing designed units with a pool of component with points values that are tabulated from the ground up. I can hypothesize a unit that has a 2 Lascannons and 10 strong melee attacks as base default. Oh no, it doesn't have a single role! But if the hypothetical unit cost 30 points each to put on the table, all of a sudden it doesn't matter does it?

You're saying that if you want strong guns, to take other things than the PBC with Entropy Cannons? Yes, that's what I've been saying. Is the PBC with Entropy Cannons a comparatively resilient platform for what it is? Of course it is. Do I think 3 or so PBC with Entropy Cannons sitting 'a bit up the field behind a screen' is a competitive tournament list? I don't.

Halfpast_Yellow wrote:
Tone down the aggressive ignorance thanks.

On a PBC, the Plague Spitters are the 'main gun'. You can take only Drones if you want, never said not to. But if you don't think, for your plague spitter platform, that +1T, +2W, +1S, a bonus Heavy Mortar weapon and an extra 18 points up your sleeve vs +1M and FLY is a legitimate list building consideration for competitive then just stop replying to this topic and save yourself the blood pressure.

Your 'decent role/schizophrenic' argument is irrelevant rhetoric because we aren't discussing designed units with a pool of component with points values that are tabulated from the ground up. I can hypothesize a unit that has a 2 Lascannons and 10 strong melee attacks as base default. Oh no, it doesn't have a single role! But if the hypothetical unit cost 30 points each to put on the table, all of a sudden it doesn't matter does it?

Except, we kinda are. We are discussing which base a weapon with fixed cost works well on.

See, this is what I find weird about you argument: you hate PBC with entropy cannons as it is too defensive and lacks range and power compared to other options that fill the same role. But... that's exactly what PBC with plaguespitters suffers from. It's easily tarpitted with no melee power and short range "main guns" if you use it as an assault platform, meaning it won't put out anywhere near the damage of a bloat drone.

Look, plaguespitters aren't amazing even if your enemy is running hordes. You'll get roughly 5-6 kills a turn from firing on guardsmen, which isn't that amazing for something in the 130-140 price range. What makes the bloat drone good is it can consistently do this turn after turn without much fear of being locked in place, with acceptable melee power as well. Because you really need to be getting 4 or 5 turns of shooting to make it a worthwhile investment. The only thing that makes the bloatdrone good is the ability to fly, the plaguespitters themselves aren't the main selling point.

PBC with plaguespitters being used primarily as an assault vehicle will be lucky to kill half its value in points before getting bogged down for the rest of the match. We are talking a price increase for less than half the actual real world firepower. It's a horrific idea, the platform is just all wrong for the weapon.

Want an example of actual good anti infantry firepower? Take cultists. Two units in RF range out perform a bloat drone or PBC with plaguespitters, and costs 80 points as opposed to the 130 range. But they struggle somewhat to stay around, meaning you likely only get 2-3 turns of shooting if that, while a bloat drone sticks around for most of the game. So a PBC that will likely get 2-3 turns of shooting before getting shutdown by being locked into combat lacks both actual impressive firepower for cost or staying power. It's durability is irrelevant when it can be trivialized so easily. Which is hilarious because apparently you think position so you stay in 36" of the enemy tanks is really unreasonable to do consistently, but locking a PBC in combat is apparently really hard?

PBC with entropy cannons are my main way of killing IG tanks. I run into IG and SM all the time, especially in tournaments, and the PBC do more work for me than my bloat drones. Even if I wanted to give them spitters, they still can't overwatch against deepstrikers due to the range. I screen them with cultists anyway to prevent them being charged. Against the -1 to hit armies I play against they still put in work. A lord with arch contaminator really helps punch through the damage. Even if 1 cannon hits thats still a S8 -4 shot, and they're only a few more points each than the stock spitters. I prefer them over preds or hellbrutes due to the durability. They soak up tons og shots before dying.

 Fenris-77 wrote:
This isn't even really a mathammer question for me, or at least not just a mathammer question (although knowing the numbers is obviously key at any level of competitiveness). The Entropy cannon provides reasonably efficient ranged Anti-tank in a list that has a significant overall lack of ranged anti-tank. The Spitters might be better, as a weapon, from an efficiency standpoint, but the argument here, IMO anyway, is about opportunity cost and efficiency, not just efficiency. Any DG list will have multiple redundancy for the kind of damage Spitters do, but tno so much for the cannon.

This right here. The problem with mathhammer is it's in a vacuum which doesn't factor in tactics at all. And let's be real, if we're talking tournament then you shouldn't even be bothering list building, just do what every other tournament player does, take Mortarion, Magnus, and 200 poxwalkers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 KiloFiX wrote:
Any thoughts on using Las/Missile Helbrute as an anti-armor alternative to Haulers, PBC or Predators?

And in my opinion the las/missile helbrute is the best anti tank we have.

Danny slag wrote:

 Fenris-77 wrote:
This isn't even really a mathammer question for me, or at least not just a mathammer question (although knowing the numbers is obviously key at any level of competitiveness). The Entropy cannon provides reasonably efficient ranged Anti-tank in a list that has a significant overall lack of ranged anti-tank. The Spitters might be better, as a weapon, from an efficiency standpoint, but the argument here, IMO anyway, is about opportunity cost and efficiency, not just efficiency. Any DG list will have multiple redundancy for the kind of damage Spitters do, but tno so much for the cannon.

This right here. The problem with mathhammer is it's in a vacuum which doesn't factor in tactics at all. And let's be real, if we're talking tournament then you shouldn't even be bothering list building, just do what every other tournament player does, take Mortarion, Magnus, and 200 poxwalkers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 KiloFiX wrote:
Any thoughts on using Las/Missile Helbrute as an anti-armor alternative to Haulers, PBC or Predators?

And in my opinion the las/missile helbrute is the best anti tank we have.

I have been running lots of different helbrutes lately (last game I had 4 with different builds) and I gotta say that the helbrutes need to be either 100% offensive or atleast have 1 fist. I recently assembled my leviathan dreadnought with two gravs and man wasn't that the MVP of the match I played it on. 2D3 shots, bs2+ (can move and fire heavies without penalty because of the helbrute-keyword and lord can give him reroll 1 aura), wounds most tanks on 3+ (S9) and with AP-5 no tank will receive cover. The best part? It deals 5 damage per wound vs monsters, vehicles and titanics. I took down a daemon prince with him quite easily. He also took down 2 squads of marines, 1 helbrute and destroyed one predator.

Sadly our version has 5+ invulnerable save vs shooting so it is rather easy to take down if you don't have more pressing threats.

So any ideas for mixing DG with the new daemons yet? Assuming Reecious is right, we will not be able to deep strike Mortarion or any other daemons from the DG codex.
First of all, all Death Guard units which are nurgle daemons are daemon princes, Mortarion, HQs on palanquin of nurgle, PBC, blight haulers, drones, defilers and possessed. Any units besides those don't get any benefit from Codex: Chaos Daemons, except for not dying from nurgle's rot and similar effects.

I bought the codex and the three most interesting things I found was the already spoiled Locus of Virulence (+1 damage on to wound of 6+, daemons only), the nurgle tree and the two nurgle psychic powers Shriveling Pox (-1T for enemy withing 18") and Virulent Blessing (+1 to wound in fight phase, double damage on 7+, daemon target only).
There is also a power that heals daemons for d3, a 7" smite which automatically does d6 wounds to units with 10+ models, Nurgle's Rot(same as DG stratagem) and Miamasa of Pestilence, which is the same power as DG gets. So even if you have more that two psykers, the other powers aren't terrible.

The locus is pretty obvious to use, buy any character and sit him next to your PBC or blight haulers. Whenever one of the daemon engines rolls a 6+ to wound for its shooting attacks, it does one more damage. PBC have lots of shots, so there are lots of chances for extra damage.
You can also use a Daemon Prince of Chaos (that's the name of the codex:dameons data slate) to give this buff to your drones, but you'll lose the suppurating plate if you don't want to bring two daemon princes. Sadly, all nurgle relics are bad, and none of the warlord traits are outstandingly good.

Shriveling Pox is nice to support PBC as you can drop T8 vehicles down to T7, which makes them a lot better against them. Or you could debuff a T3/T4 unit to T2/T3 to wound them better with bolters or autoguns and/or poxwalker melee.
Virulent Blessing is nice since it stacks with Putrid Blades and Veterans of the Long war, allowing your a Daemon Prince of Nurgle buffed with all three to wound anything on a 2+, do 3 damage per hit on a 3+ (locus) and 5 damage to it on a 4+. Shredding a titanic model has never been this easy. One of the nurgle warlord traits is +1 to wound against non-vehicles so you could even go completely nuts if feel like crushing some wraith constructs or tyranid monsters.

Bad news is that the only nurgle psykers are Rotigus, GUO, poxbringer (formerly known as herald of nurgle) and daemon princes. At 70 points, poxbringers are cheap enough to field even without using +1S aura, but only get one psychic power.
So to get the maximum out of a daemons detachment, you would field a Daemon Prince of Chaos to accompany your blight drones (and maybe a second prince with plate) and cast Virulent Blessings, plus a poxbringer with Shriveling Pox to buff whatever daemon engines you are bringing and debuff their targets. To make a full detachment you could either add another herald or Epidemius(unchanged except for melee AP) to make it a supreme command detachment or add 3 units of nurglings for 54 each to get 3 CP.
Cheapest access to loci and powers would be 210 to field three heralds. Even with the limits hinted at by Reece, you could still use the stratagem to make double perils damage on an enemy psyker for -1CP.

So, the nurgle tree is a completely indestructible piece of terrain after being deployed for just 50 points and provides 4 buff auras.
1) Nurgle daemons that are neither vehicles nor monsters get +2 cover. Yay possessed? Otherwise provides nurgle dameons with 4+ armor.
2) Causes mortal wounds to non-nurgle units nearby. I guess it's cute to create a choke point with this against melee-oriented armies. Won't do anything against gunlines
3) Nurgle daemons can fall back without drawbacks near them. Plant one near your PBCs and they can still shoot after getting charges. You still have to move them though...
4) Reroll any of your summoning dice. Nobody cares.
For 150 points you can get 3 of them and wall off some part of the battlefield, for example an objective or a position in the middle of your battlefield. You can also go full troll and fit up to 9 in a single fortification network detachment and play tower defense with your tyranid, khorne or ork opponent. I think the main value for DG is getting some blocking terrain against assault armies, but I'm not sure it's worth the trouble.

How does deploying train pieces such as the Nurgle tree work in 8th? Can you put them where you want?