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Fragmentize wrote:
Is the Death Guard half of the Dark Imperium box a good way to start the army? (or is it not recommended due to limits on weapon upgrades etc?)

Or are there better alternatives?

I recently purchased a box of Easy To Build Plague Marines and had a blast painting them and made me want to build an army.

Suggestions greatly appreciated!

I like using it, got two... But you might want to do some converting
5man squads of plaguemarines with 2xblightlaunchers combined with a Chaos lord warlord with helmet and archcontanimator, can do some serious damage. And people never fire enough at them to take them out, always 2-3dudes left standing.
And the blightdrones are good, and cheap compared to how much they cost when bought alone.
Poxwalkers are not good. (Now don't get me wrong, poxwalkers are great! but you must build your army around them to make them work. And that requires a lot of poxwalkers, and cultists) I have cut of most of the mutations, horns etc. and added weapons to 20of them, and are using them as cultists. They will also get a more "healthy looking fleshtone" to stand out more. (But nothing is stopping you from adding them to a expanding poxwalker unit if you feel like it later on.
I have also converted one each of the malignant plaguecaster and Noxious blightbringer into Foul Blightspawns. And those boys can be properly efficient!

Also, get nurglings and a Poxbringer. Those guys help the deathguard army so much! I regret not getting them sooner.

If he has the ETB marines, he already has a plasma sergeant

I started the army with 2x Dark Imperium, except for the lord of contagion, all of the models are playable even after starting to grow your collection. Just have the LoC count as chaos lord in terminator armor and power axe, and you're set.
When you combine the ETB marines with the ones from dark imperium you get one unit with 3 special weapons (2x plasma 1x blight launcher), if you add the marines box later (or another DI and ETB set) you'll end up with two well equipped squads.

When buying a second set of Dark Imperium Death Guard keep in mind that you'll rarely need any of the characters twice. You might pay less if you only get the marine squad, the drone and the pox walkers.

 Jidmah wrote:
If he has the ETB marines, he already has a plasma sergeant

I started the army with 2x Dark Imperium, except for the lord of contagion, all of the models are playable even after starting to grow your collection. Just have the LoC count as chaos lord in terminator armor and power axe, and you're set.
When you combine the ETB marines with the ones from dark imperium you get one unit with 3 special weapons (2x plasma 1x blight launcher), if you add the marines box later (or another DI and ETB set) you'll end up with two well equipped squads.

When buying a second set of Dark Imperium Death Guard keep in mind that you'll rarely need any of the characters twice. You might pay less if you only get the marine squad, the drone and the pox walkers.

Lord of Contagions suffer from lack of a ranged weapon option. if they bhad a combi bolter or something they'd be pretty solid picks.

BrianDavion wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
If he has the ETB marines, he already has a plasma sergeant

I started the army with 2x Dark Imperium, except for the lord of contagion, all of the models are playable even after starting to grow your collection. Just have the LoC count as chaos lord in terminator armor and power axe, and you're set.
When you combine the ETB marines with the ones from dark imperium you get one unit with 3 special weapons (2x plasma 1x blight launcher), if you add the marines box later (or another DI and ETB set) you'll end up with two well equipped squads.

When buying a second set of Dark Imperium Death Guard keep in mind that you'll rarely need any of the characters twice. You might pay less if you only get the marine squad, the drone and the pox walkers.

Lord of Contagions suffer from lack of a ranged weapon option. if they bhad a combi bolter or something they'd be pretty solid picks.

Lord of Contagions Nurgles gift is also really lackluster compared to Chaoslords reroll aura. I, to be honest don't even consider Lord of Contagion an option....

 Wibe wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
If he has the ETB marines, he already has a plasma sergeant

I started the army with 2x Dark Imperium, except for the lord of contagion, all of the models are playable even after starting to grow your collection. Just have the LoC count as chaos lord in terminator armor and power axe, and you're set.
When you combine the ETB marines with the ones from dark imperium you get one unit with 3 special weapons (2x plasma 1x blight launcher), if you add the marines box later (or another DI and ETB set) you'll end up with two well equipped squads.

When buying a second set of Dark Imperium Death Guard keep in mind that you'll rarely need any of the characters twice. You might pay less if you only get the marine squad, the drone and the pox walkers.

Lord of Contagions suffer from lack of a ranged weapon option. if they bhad a combi bolter or something they'd be pretty solid picks.

Lord of Contagions Nurgles gift is also really lackluster compared to Chaoslords reroll aura. I, to be honest don't even consider Lord of Contagion an option....

Yeah the LOC's aura is definatly not as good. I can see some limited sues for it. eaither rushing it ahead with a melee strike force of termies, or back stopping a shooting line you don't want to be charged. could be a handy HQ to have if you're regularly fighting custodes.

So I have an army I'm really happy with (fluff, composition, all the models, etc), but I have a bit of an OCD issue haha. Everything has disgustingly resilient, except for my Spawn. They have so far been really good in the games I've used them in, but it's annoying me they don't have DR and I was wandering if anyone had any ideas on how to swap them to Plague Drones without changing the army. I can't seem to find a way to do it without taking out a few things to make room for more Daemons to fill a daemon detachment for the drones. Any suggestions?

This is my current army:

HQ
- Daemon Prince w/ Wings
- Lord of Contagion
TROOP
- 7x Plague Marines w/ Blight Launchers
- 7x Plague Marines w/ Blight Launchers
- 16x Pox Walkers
ELITE
- 3x Deathshroud
FAST ATTACK
- Bloat-drone
- 3x Spawn
- 3x Spawn
HEAVY SUPPORT
- PBC
- PBC
LoW
- Mortarion

Thanks in advance

You can summon the plague drones. Not the best tho as you have none of the characters that are ok with standing still.
Alternative is an auxiliary detachment for 1cp.

Captyn_Bob wrote:
You can summon the plague drones. Not the best tho as you have none of the characters that are ok with standing still.
Alternative is an auxiliary detachment for 1cp.

Ah, that's actually a really good idea to put them in an Auxiliary Detachment, thanks for that. Not sure why I didn't consider it myself

BrianDavion wrote:
Yeah the LOC's aura is definatly not as good. I can see some limited sues for it. eaither rushing it ahead with a melee strike force of termies, or back stopping a shooting line you don't want to be charged. could be a handy HQ to have if you're regularly fighting custodes.

The part about rushing him ahead is kind of difficult since he is really, really slow (4" and low advance rolls). The last time I played him, a wraithlord kept moving just outside of his charge range and blasted him with his guns for three (!) turns.

I really don't see myself ever using him again. A chaos lord can do everything he can do for less points and has a better aura and for a few more points than a LoC you could have a daemon prince or Typhus.

Quick question... Are Contemptors with dual chainclaws and soulburners any good in a DG army? I have about 440 points spare and I really need some anti armour in the list (only have the DP and Drones that can hurt T7+ really).

Has anyone used them? Am I better going with lascannon Helbrutes or Predators? I don't own any PBCs and don't play uber competitive, plus I'm not really fond of the models tbh so they're not really an option. I'm even tempted by a Battalion of Nurglings to get some Obliterators... Not sure what to do.

 Jidmah wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
Yeah the LOC's aura is definatly not as good. I can see some limited sues for it. eaither rushing it ahead with a melee strike force of termies, or back stopping a shooting line you don't want to be charged. could be a handy HQ to have if you're regularly fighting custodes.

The part about rushing him ahead is kind of difficult since he is really, really slow (4" and low advance rolls). The last time I played him, a wraithlord kept moving just outside of his charge range and blasted him with his guns for three (!) turns.

I really don't see myself ever using him again. A chaos lord can do everything he can do for less points and has a better aura and for a few more points than a LoC you could have a daemon prince or Typhus.

ohh I agree definatly situational. I do think a back stop for a shooting line to dischourage a charge is proably the more useful trick with it. make charging your gun lines a little nastier, but even then, 1 mortal wound isn't that much to the kinda units you'd want to use that trick for, and you can't stack the Aura

BrianDavion wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
Yeah the LOC's aura is definatly not as good. I can see some limited sues for it. eaither rushing it ahead with a melee strike force of termies, or back stopping a shooting line you don't want to be charged. could be a handy HQ to have if you're regularly fighting custodes.

The part about rushing him ahead is kind of difficult since he is really, really slow (4" and low advance rolls). The last time I played him, a wraithlord kept moving just outside of his charge range and blasted him with his guns for three (!) turns.

I really don't see myself ever using him again. A chaos lord can do everything he can do for less points and has a better aura and for a few more points than a LoC you could have a daemon prince or Typhus.

ohh I agree definatly situational. I do think a back stop for a shooting line to dischourage a charge is proably the more useful trick with it. make charging your gun lines a little nastier, but even then, 1 mortal wound isn't that much to the kinda units you'd want to use that trick for, and you can't stack the Aura

I've had a lot of luck with my LoC. I don't dispute that he's probably not the greatest option, but he's a pretty nice distraction unit, who's surprisingly tough and cheap enough that I don't feel like I'm wasting points. I tend to drop him on a flank, either the one Mortarion is rushing or the opposite. If he doesn't make it into combat, he herds the enemy away from him into more of my stuff, or the enemy waste bullets on him.

Btw, I've not seen the Plague Surgeon being used much and hear he's not worth his points, but has anyone found him useful at all? Maybe giving him the relic for +3" range on auras could also help. He's a sweet model also. If he's really not that great, perhaps this rumoured March rebalancing will change him a little

 Tiberius501 wrote:
Btw, I've not seen the Plague Surgeon being used much and hear he's not worth his points, but has anyone found him useful at all? Maybe giving him the relic for +3" range on auras could also help. He's a sweet model also. If he's really not that great, perhaps this rumoured March rebalancing will change him a little

Point for point hes not worth it. I think someone calculated it was like less than a 20% improvement on survival. 65 points can get you:
- Almost 1 Blightbringer (much more useful...)
- 10 more Poxwalkers
- Tallyman (much more useful for recouping CP, and his reroll ability is good too)
- 16 more cultists

Its just very hard to justify. He doesn't hit very hard, hes yet another Poxwalker support model, and using your Artefact for a 6" versus a 3" bubble isn't too great. If he was "Add 1 to all disgustingly resilient rolls for DG infantry" I'd almost say hes an auto include. But as is, I think hes too weak to justify him over other stuff

Less than 20% would be awesome, it's around 5.55% though.

1 in 6 chance to roll a 1, 2 in 6 chance to roll 5 oder 6 afterwards, for a total of 2 in 36 for the re-roll to do anything.

 Jidmah wrote:
Less than 20% would be awesome, it's around 5.55% though.

1 in 6 chance to roll a 1, 2 in 6 chance to roll 5 oder 6 afterwards, for a total of 2 in 36 for the re-roll to do anything.

There we go, I was too lazy to math

Ah okay haha. Well I hope he gets buffed at some point. Thanks for the info

So I've decided to start Death Guard, right now I have the dark imperium box, and know no fear, as well as a quick build box of plague marines, giving me 2 Lord of Contagions,1 noxiss blightbringer 1 malignant plague caster, 2 squads of plague marines (aiming for 2 squads of 7 with the easy builds) 2 feotid bloat drones, and 30 plaguewalkers, in addition I have a squad of blightlord terminators. just wondering how I should expand this. I don't wanna run a particularly cultist heavy force. I like my heretic astartes to have heretic astartes in their ranks. proably start with a deamon prince or two should I invest in Rhinos for the Plague marines?

I started very similar to how you did. After the daemon prince, I have added the Tallyman for CP regeneration and the Foul Blightspawn for his flamer of doom to take down planes and tough models that want to get close. I also started using the LoC as Chaos Lord with Terminator armor and power axe to a great effect.

Plague marines don't need rhinos unless they are melee oriented. Just buff the unit with the plasma weapons with cloud of flies for the first few turns (try to get the CP back with Tallyman) and have the blight launcher unit in cover near an objective and cast Miasma of Pestilence on them if they are drawing too much attention. You also have at least four T5 3+/5+++ bolter marines they need to chew through before you actually lose something valuable.

What the starter set is lacking IMO is anti-tank. Therefore, instead of rhinos you should try to get PBC, helbrutes, a defiler or predators, with PBC being the most competitive option obviously. Or you buy Mortarion, he is anti-everything.

 Jidmah wrote:
I started very similar to how you did. After the daemon prince, I have added the Tallyman for CP regeneration and the Foul Blightspawn for his flamer of doom to take down planes and tough models that want to get close. I also started using the LoC as Chaos Lord with Terminator armor and power axe to a great effect.

Plague marines don't need rhinos unless they are melee oriented. Just buff the unit with the plasma weapons with cloud of flies for the first few turns (try to get the CP back with Tallyman) and have the blight launcher unit in cover near an objective and cast Miasma of Pestilence on them if they are drawing too much attention. You also have at least four T5 3+/5+++ bolter marines they need to chew through before you actually lose something valuable.

What the starter set is lacking IMO is anti-tank. Therefore, instead of rhinos you should try to get PBC, helbrutes, a defiler or predators, with PBC being the most competitive option obviously. Or you buy Mortarion, he is anti-everything.

yeah definatly leaning towards a PBC or two. and probly snag morty as a showpiece even if I never use him. he can hang out beside gulliman on my shelf

So I have made the most satisfying army ever. 7 CP's, 14 units, 42 models, 7 Psychic Powers. All those 7's make me harder than a Slaanesh Daemon

 Tiberius501 wrote:
So I have made the most satisfying army ever. 7 CP's, 14 units, 42 models, 7 Psychic Powers. All those 7's make me harder than a Slaanesh Daemon

post the list?

I don’t know if it’s particularly competitive, but Nurgle would be proud:

Battalion Detachment

HQ
- Lord of Contagion
- Plaguecaster
TROOP
- 7x Plague Marines w/ 2x blight launchers, 1x plasma gun
- 7x Plague Marines w/ 2x blight launchers, 1x plasma gun
- 15x Poxwalkers
ELITE
- 3x Deathshroud
FAST ATTACK
- Bloat-drone w/ spitters
HEAVY SUPPORT
- PBC
- PBC

Outrider Detachment

HQ
- Daemon Prince w/ wings
FAST ATTACK
- 1x Spawn
- 1x Spawn
- 1x Spawn

Super Heavy Auxilliary

LoW
- Mortarion

7 Powers (Morty knows 3, Plague caster 2, prince 1, + Smite), 7CP for detachments, total of 14 units, 42 models, 2000pts on the dot.

that's actually pretty good. it's fluffy as heck. I like it.

Thanks I’m pretty proud haha

I d use typhus you can cut some from marines
that way you could have poxwalkers and typhus building numbers at the back and become your super big obj last stand last effort solution.

I had my first DG game since the daemon book came out. Decided to drop my attachment to big scary models, and run what I originally thought would be a pretty cool list, of a bunch of plague marines.

I ran 4 units of 7 marines in a rhino. 2 blight launchers, 2 flails, and plasma on champ. Each rhino also had a foul blightspawn in it, and I had 2 malefic plagucasters as HQ. Heavy support was 3 PBC with flamers.

I faced eldar, and did pretty great. Using the PBC as an agressive blocker and harassment unit, instead of back field fire support was really awesome. They pulled tons of fire, and while are slower than a bloat drone, are much more resilient.
All of the PM did work, I really do love how good blight launchers are, and prefer them to plasma 100%. The real disgusting part of the list was having 4 foul blightspawn though. They were MVPs, I rolled exceptionally hot on turn 2, firing all 4 of them. 4-6 shots and S8 was the lowest I rolled. They tore things up.

The flails continued to be a hilariously fun CC weapon with wounds spilling over. Lots of hot dice with 2 flails and vilurent blessing had 7 banshees splattered all over the floor.

The game really made me respect the lowly rhino. I've been avoiding them since I ran rhino rush in 5th, the frustration of massed vehicle facing and arcs left such a bad taste in my mouth. I need to convert 4 more flails and 4 more blight launchers so I can stop proxying.

I'm considering swapping one of the casters for a chaos lord to get some re-rolls to hit, combined with arch contaminator he would be a decent little buff bank.

Quick question, can rhinos transport jump pack infantry units?
I don't see why they couldn't but I could be wrong.

 gwarsh41 wrote:
I had my first DG game since the daemon book came out. Decided to drop my attachment to big scary models, and run what I originally thought would be a pretty cool list, of a bunch of plague marines.

I ran 4 units of 7 marines in a rhino. 2 blight launchers, 2 flails, and plasma on champ. Each rhino also had a foul blightspawn in it, and I had 2 malefic plagucasters as HQ. Heavy support was 3 PBC with flamers.

I faced eldar, and did pretty great. Using the PBC as an agressive blocker and harassment unit, instead of back field fire support was really awesome. They pulled tons of fire, and while are slower than a bloat drone, are much more resilient.
All of the PM did work, I really do love how good blight launchers are, and prefer them to plasma 100%. The real disgusting part of the list was having 4 foul blightspawn though. They were MVPs, I rolled exceptionally hot on turn 2, firing all 4 of them. 4-6 shots and S8 was the lowest I rolled. They tore things up.

The flails continued to be a hilariously fun CC weapon with wounds spilling over. Lots of hot dice with 2 flails and vilurent blessing had 7 banshees splattered all over the floor.

The game really made me respect the lowly rhino. I've been avoiding them since I ran rhino rush in 5th, the frustration of massed vehicle facing and arcs left such a bad taste in my mouth. I need to convert 4 more flails and 4 more blight launchers so I can stop proxying.

I'm considering swapping one of the casters for a chaos lord to get some re-rolls to hit, combined with arch contaminator he would be a decent little buff bank.

Quick question, can rhinos transport jump pack infantry units?
I don't see why they couldn't but I could be wrong.

My DG Codex isn't handy, but I know in the Space Marines one Jump Pack units count as 2 instead of 1.

Aleister_Dakka wrote:

 gwarsh41 wrote:
I had my first DG game since the daemon book came out. Decided to drop my attachment to big scary models, and run what I originally thought would be a pretty cool list, of a bunch of plague marines.

I ran 4 units of 7 marines in a rhino. 2 blight launchers, 2 flails, and plasma on champ. Each rhino also had a foul blightspawn in it, and I had 2 malefic plagucasters as HQ. Heavy support was 3 PBC with flamers.

I faced eldar, and did pretty great. Using the PBC as an agressive blocker and harassment unit, instead of back field fire support was really awesome. They pulled tons of fire, and while are slower than a bloat drone, are much more resilient.
All of the PM did work, I really do love how good blight launchers are, and prefer them to plasma 100%. The real disgusting part of the list was having 4 foul blightspawn though. They were MVPs, I rolled exceptionally hot on turn 2, firing all 4 of them. 4-6 shots and S8 was the lowest I rolled. They tore things up.

The flails continued to be a hilariously fun CC weapon with wounds spilling over. Lots of hot dice with 2 flails and vilurent blessing had 7 banshees splattered all over the floor.

The game really made me respect the lowly rhino. I've been avoiding them since I ran rhino rush in 5th, the frustration of massed vehicle facing and arcs left such a bad taste in my mouth. I need to convert 4 more flails and 4 more blight launchers so I can stop proxying.

I'm considering swapping one of the casters for a chaos lord to get some re-rolls to hit, combined with arch contaminator he would be a decent little buff bank.

Quick question, can rhinos transport jump pack infantry units?
I don't see why they couldn't but I could be wrong.

My DG Codex isn't handy, but I know in the Space Marines one Jump Pack units count as 2 instead of 1.

DG don't have raptors so it's not listed, but per codex space marines and choas marines rhinos simply cannot transport jump pack troops

yea i'v (since 2005) run my DG army in rhinos.

They can be a real issue when you rock them as you (and i do) about 4 with PM in.

I'm liking one of mine to be the blight-drive by that is 9 naked (eep!) plague marines with a Biologus Putrifier 12" +d6 if you need to then next turn jump out 8" and chuck 10d6 blight grenade s4 2dmg re-rollin 1's to wound mortal wound on a 6 death.

charge the rhinos into other stuff to mostly prevent them doing much back at you then do it all again now on foot.