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If running Be'lakor in a Daemons-only list, just take Death Hex and Infernal Gaze as those don't require anything to have the Heretic Astartes keyword. You may not ever use Infernal Gaze much, but it's still okay to have just in case nothing in your opponent's army has an invulnerable save.
My armies (re-counted and updated on 11/7/24, including modeled wargear options):
Dark Angels: ~16000 Astra Militarum: ~1200 | Imperial Knights: ~2300 | Leagues of Votann: ~1300 | Tyranids: ~3400 | Stormcast Eternals: ~5000 | Kruleboyz: ~3500 | Lumineth Realm-Lords: ~700
Check out my P&M Blogs: ZergSmasher's P&M Blog | Imperial Knights blog | Board Games blog | Total models painted in 2024: 40 | Total models painted in 2025: 23 | Current main painting project: Tomb Kings
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote: You need your bumps felt. With a patented, Grotsnik Corp Bump Feelerer 9,000.
The Grotsnik Corp Bump Feelerer 9,000. It only looks like several bricks crudely gaffer taped to a cricket bat.
Grotsnik Corp. Sorry, No Refunds.
arhurt wrote: When running exalted flamers, do you ever use the Pistol weapon in liew of his heavy weapon?
Do you try to keep them stationary to not suffer -1 to hit or don't even bother with that and just move them wherever necessary?
They were always on the move in my games unless they got assaulted. Even then they would fly out of combat so they could shoot the higher str profile. 10" move + 18" gun seems you could park on turn 2, but in my games I had to keep moving to avoid assaults or draw line of sight on the targets I wanted. For example, In my game against Chaos, I was moving to stay out of rapid fire range ( he had 2 blobs of 20 man Word Bearers with 2 lascannons each), but get close enough them to shoot as well.
Yes, the pistol gets used quite a bit when shooting at infantry units and Overwatch.
I play:
40K: Daemons, Tau
AoS: Blades of Khorne, Disciples of Tzeentch
Warmachine: Convergence of Cyriss
Infinity: Haqqislam, Tohaa
Malifaux: Bayou
Star Wars Legion: Republic & Separatists
MESBG: Far Harad, Misty Mountains
I'm leaning heavily towards making a Slaaneshi CSM/demon force.
One model that I really like is the Fiend Of Slaanesh. I like the look of the model. Problem is, they seem sort of bad. And expensive. I've been trying to research tactics for them and can't find much for 8ed, which makes me think they are not used often. Basically, there's an ongoing conversation in my head like this:
child me: "I really want those cool models."
adult me: "dude, no they're not that good"
child me: "but they're going to look really good in the green and pink Slaanesh theme"
adult me: "they're 46 points for S3 T4"
child me: "but it'll be fun!"
adult me: "they're 30 bucks for 46 points! a large unit will cost more than a hundred bucks!"
child me: "they have bug eyes, scorpion tails and claws. I want them! now!"
So I came to the demon tactica thread hoping to gain some insight on how to actually play these models. Does anyone use them effectively? If so, how? Help child me win the argument.
A single model, not a good save, poor stats, expensive, my best advice would be not to use one at all until a codex either makes them better or replaces them with a different unit completely.
A single model, not a good save, poor stats, expensive, my best advice would be not to use one at all until a codex either makes them better or replaces them with a different unit completely.
Thank you for the no nonsense reply. They are bad. My dreams are crushed. I suppose if I love the models that much I suppose I can convert them into something else.
I really don't want to just paint my CSM pink, throw in a Keeper Of Secrets and call my army Slaaneshi. Are there any other Slaanesh demon units that are decent that could add some fluff and feeling to my CSM?
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/10/02 19:13:03
A single model, not a good save, poor stats, expensive, my best advice would be not to use one at all until a codex either makes them better or replaces them with a different unit completely.
Thank you for the no nonsense reply. They are bad. My dreams are crushed. I suppose if I love the models that much I suppose I can convert them into something else.
I really don't want to just paint my CSM pink, throw in a Keeper Of Secrets and call my army Slaaneshi. Are there any other Slaanesh demon units that are decent that could add some fluff and feeling to my CSM?
Zarakynel, the greater Daemon from FW is a pretty spicy little meatball and isn't super expensive, point wise. Seeker heralds are amazing for their speed. Chaos Lords on Slaanesh steeds are also, technically, Daemons. A lord on steed w/ 2 lightning claws is like just barely over 100pts and does tons of attacks. Give them some Heralds and they're S5 slice and dice boys.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/10/02 19:27:17
A single model, not a good save, poor stats, expensive, my best advice would be not to use one at all until a codex either makes them better or replaces them with a different unit completely.
Thank you for the no nonsense reply. They are bad. My dreams are crushed. I suppose if I love the models that much I suppose I can convert them into something else.
I really don't want to just paint my CSM pink, throw in a Keeper Of Secrets and call my army Slaaneshi. Are there any other Slaanesh demon units that are decent that could add some fluff and feeling to my CSM?
Zarakynel, the greater Daemon from FW is a pretty spicy little meatball and isn't super expensive, point wise. Seeker heralds are amazing for their speed. Chaos Lords on Slaanesh steeds are also, technically, Daemons. A lord on steed w/ 2 lightning claws is like just barely over 100pts and does tons of attacks. Give them some Heralds and they're S5 slice and dice boys.
That definitely gives me something to work with. Zarakynel is around the dollar cost of those fiends I was hoping to buy. The chariot certainly has a Slaanesh look and feel to it. I was already looking at the fantasy Lord of Slaanesh on the mount, it wouldn't be too hard to put some lightning claws on it. This was super helpful, much appreciated!
arhurt wrote: We all agree that soul grinders are terrible given their low BS and inability to negate the - 1 from moving and firing heavy weapons right?
Daemons are in a very weird place, where there are a small handful of units, (Princes, Exalted Flamers, BRIMSTONE** Horrors, Changeling) that are good, and everything else is absolutely hot, steaming Garbage.
Screamers, Flamers (these are okay, at best), Chariots, Lords of Change, Kairos, All Khorne Daemons, almost all Slaanesh daemons, it's just really, really bad. They have very little impact, then either not enough movement or synergy (why do TZEENTCH HERALDS give a STR bonus?) to themselves, otherwise.
Cephalobeard wrote: Daemons are in a very weird place, where there are a small handful of units, (Princes, Exalted Flamers, BRIMSTONE** Horrors, Changeling) that are good, and everything else is absolutely hot, steaming Garbage.
Screamers, Flamers (these are okay, at best), Chariots, Lords of Change, Kairos, All Khorne Daemons, almost all Slaanesh daemons, it's just really, really bad. They have very little impact, then either not enough movement or synergy (why do TZEENTCH HERALDS give a STR bonus?) to themselves, otherwise.
I strongly agree. Daemons need a codex very badly. The points drops helped but they are not enough. I think Slaanesh is good but suffers from the same issues as the rest of the codex, i.e. shooting armies are too good and the new bonkers IG codex makes the best shooting army even stronger. And on top of that Grey Knights are extra strong versus daemons, and then IG also just got a new anti-Chaos super relic.
Some thoughts about what could change with a codex.
Will nurgle daemons the mortal wounds for standing there beasts that death guard can be?
Will the Warp Storm be a stratagem, like the boon table?
Will chaos daemons gain a unique keyword that isn't just DAEMON?
Do you think daemons will resume the role of "Cog in your plans" army that they have been in the past.
I think daemons have a long way to go for their codex. Whatever GW will do with slaanesh, in any event we need a good lot of new sculpts for a huge chunk of the codex. I worry we may be one of the last.
I don't want to see the Warpstorm table come back, at all. I want to see gods get their flair back.
Nurgle should be incredibly beefy, for defense. Being close to them should be bad, like the current "mortal wound" aura idea.
Tzeentch should be all about spells. Abilities that allow them to ignore the once per turn ability, Kairos should be primarch level with his abilities and stats.
Slaanesh should all run and charge, having an increased save in melee to reflect their dexterity.
Khorne should do massive amounts of attacks at a high STR rating, and possibly gain benefits off of the number of units slain during the battle.
All greater Daemons need to be reduced in points or massively increased in power.
I want to run Kairos. I want to run lords of change. Hell, I want to run Pink Horrors. None of that is viable, in the slightest.
Pink horrors are simultaneously the best and worst unit to have in your list. If you are playing power level they are great, but points play they are terrible. The whole split system needs reworking because you get better mileage out of multiple brimstone units than a pink unit point for point.
I personally would love to see a version of Daemonic Instability come back, something like: "Each model slain in the assault phase counts for two slain models in the moral phase. Models slain in any other phase do not count towards the slain tally for Morale"
I think this would help daemons get where they want to be and negates our poor leadership against shooting armies.
I feel Slaanesh stuff apart from Daemonettes, heralds and daemon princes are overpriced, seekers are just so ridiculously over costed at 19pts they should be more like 12-14 like they used to be.
The keeper of secrets is good if he actually reaches combat but he never will with a disgraceful 5++ .
I think Seekers are reasonably priced. Similar damage/survivability as 2 daemonetts, but with twice the move and advance+charge. They are capable of threatening upto 34" worth of stuff! Probably the best Slaanesh unit IMO.
Totally agree on KoS though. The only chance it has to survive is if you provide more immediate threats for your opponent to deal with.
Everything not seeing play is overpriced. How can you say deamonettes are fine if they are completelly outclassed by bloodletters, not to mention most of the troops in game?
They should be 6pts
Cephalobeard wrote: Daemons are in a very weird place, where there are a small handful of units, (Princes, Exalted Flamers, BRIMSTONE** Horrors, Changeling) that are good, and everything else is absolutely hot, steaming Garbage.
Screamers, Flamers (these are okay, at best), Chariots, Lords of Change, Kairos, All Khorne Daemons, almost all Slaanesh daemons, it's just really, really bad. They have very little impact, then either not enough movement or synergy (why do TZEENTCH HERALDS give a STR bonus?) to themselves, otherwise.
Does everyone feel that way about Burning Chariots? I've been using 1-3 (I am VERY new I must admit) and they always seem to get quite a bit of work done just tying things up infront of daemon princes. Is there a unit I could be doing this better with or a better way to get my other stuff in without being sploded? It does seem like their ballistic skill is a little low to make reliable use of the blue flame unless you are placed defensively.
JakeSiren wrote: Would 6 points even be reasonable for them? I still don't see myself taking them over bloodletters to save 30 points on a full squad.
Bloodletters are s5 on the charge with 2 attacks each at ap -3.
Daemonettes are s3 on the charge with 2 attacks at ap-1 with a chance of ap-4.
I think Daemonetts need an additional attack to set themselves out from bloodletters.
Yeah, actually doing the math they need to be 5 pts each. As then their damage would equal bloodletters against hordes. Bloodletters would still remain better against armour. However Daemonettes would have the durability advantage through sheer numbers
So I played a 1k points game yesterday, my Nurgle Daemons vs a friends Ynnari.
He was packing 2 x Archons, Kabalite Warriors, Wyches, Kabalite Trueborn, a clawed fiend, scourges, as well as a raider and some Venoms.
I was running a full squad of Nurglings, full squad of Plague Drones, a GUO, Epidemus, and a Fetid Bloat Drone. (I ran the death guard datasheet versions where appropriate)
Given the amount of poison that he had in his list I was sure he was going to wipe out my GUO and Plague Drones with ease.
We played the Eternal War Retrieval Mission. I managed to lose the roll off for placing objectives which allowed me to chose the map deployment type. Given the nature of his army I chose Front-Line Assault. to reduce the amount of distance I needed to cover before I got to him.
Since I had less drops I had the option to go first. He had deployed towards the back of the board, so I was unable to get close enough to even try and assault.
I cast smite with my GUO and rolled over a 10. He then rolled a 6 for the number of mortal wounds which was enough to kill one of the Venoms. First blood to me.
His turn one had his scourges drop down and shoot at Epidemus. No damage was suffered. The rest of the turn was then spent largely shooting at my Plague Drones which due to a combination of bad rolling on his behalf and good rolling on mine only resulted in two casualties.
He charged into the drones with both units of Warriors, and due to mis-measurement he found himself out of SfD range for most of his other units.
My turn two was spent having the drones finishing off the two warrior squads. My Fetid Bloat Drone moved up to put some pain onto one of his vehicles and assault into an Archon. The second Archon in his list intervened, but neither of them could put any real pain onto the Bloat Drone.
His turn two had his archons run back into his raider and run away. More shooting occurred at the Plague Drones and dropped a few more. I got lucky and rolled a 1 for moral and returned one to play.
The rest of the turns were largely spent with the Plague Drones + Fetid Bloat Drone chasing the vehicles around and taking them out. Turn 5 resulted in a tabling for my friend.
Over all the Plague Drones performed remarkably well. The Bloat Drone was nice as it synergized well with the rest of the army and helped towards Epidemus's count. The GUO was largely irrelevant due to the other fast units in my list (maybe a winged Daemon Price could work better?). With a different deployment map I think that game would have gone differently as he would have got more shooting off and been able to kite my units better.
Tzeentch/etc unit review by a complete newb (I've played 4 games and done a whole lot of reading).
Spoiler:
Daemon Prince of Chaos with Wings & Talons: A- These guys really melt faces when they get in to combat, and the aura is a nice cherry on top. If I run less than 3 of them however they seem to become expensive bullet magnets. The remedy to this is having a unit infront to screen them, but horrors are too slow unless you wait for turn 3 to charge a shooty army. More smites is good. Plan on experimenting footslogging a non winged nurgle one or two and herald behind two 30man plaguebearer squads this week, will update you on that.
Herald of Tzeentch +/- Chariot: C- The foot slogging model is okay for cheap 24'' smite, but in the long run they just feel like double cost gakky malefic lords. Str buff seems pretty useless to my horror blob, and well... pretty much all tzeentch units. The one on chariot can keep up with princes to buff them to 8str which could be significant against marines etc.
The Changeling: A+ The aura is just too valuable to pass up for 100pts, he forms the core of my "tasty candy center" protected by horrors, and is usually my warlord pick unless I suspect enemy assassins (Maybe this isn't smart of me? but he never really gets hit so far) . The melee is really just an unnecessary bonus, but can be surprisingly good if you use it properly. I managed to get one into the backline, copy an Azrael/weapon and exploded an enemy parking lot with it recently. Smite is good.
Pink Horrors: D+ They cost SO much for a unit that has a typical lifecycle as follows [Advance, fire 20 shots, deal between 0-notfuckingone wounds, fail to manifest smite, lose 6 models, spend CPor lose models to morale, wish you'd brought brimstones instead] I've tried to work them into my armies but I just can't. I could see some validity in a larger squad of them with points in reserve to be flexible with your reinforcements... however even then with the way morale eats away the unit right now I can't find that feasible. Even if it were a good strategy, blues do the same thing for half the points and 1 split is just fine. The change to smite really makes no sense considering I could still take just under 3 squads of brim+blue and still get about as much smite dmg out.
Blue Horrors: F+ Trashbag garbage unit. Good for putting a single one in a brimstone unit so they don't lose a model when smiting (hence the F+). If you were going to employ a strat where you wanted a sticky unit using split mechanics I suppose you would be better off running blues than pinks.
Brimstone Horrors: S Without these guys I would literally die to marines before I got to make charges. Every game I've played has them performing equally to pink horror squads at around 1/3 the cost. If these weren't in our list I would lose 300-500 points to shooting on turn 1 in my 1000-1500 point games. They can even smite and the only risk is you lose a 3 pt model.. whoopee?
Flamers: C+ I've had mixed results with flamers. They have a tendency to get rubbed out early and provide first blood, however if I can get them properly positioned on a unit they can really unleash hell; letting 9d6 automatic hit shots off on cheap models (or any for that matter) is satisfying. All in all I feel like they may be better than I have experienced so far but take a different type of list than I bring or perhaps simply improved strategy. Furthermore, I have yet to fight an army that really wants to be in melee with me, I can see these being a very useful screen against charging/deepstriking units.
Burning Chariot: B The heavy blue flame hits like a MAC TRUCK, however the model has a relatively low BS and is going to be moving. I personally haven't needed the anti armor from it so far due to the limited games/opponents I have faced, however I can see that becoming an issue (one helped in part by positioning I suppose). The pink flame is a normal flamer pistol 1d6 auto hit, which is nice on a flying unit that is also fairly effective in melee. I personally use these units as a moving screen and tie up shooters and priority targets with them ahead of my Daemon Princes. I've read that some people don't like them but I don't understand the reasoning and I'd love to be enlightened as to what these should actually be used for, if anything.
Malefic Lord: S+++++++++++++++Lololol 30 points? Why do the heralds even exist? See below for a fun 1k army list your buddies are sure to love playing against!
Super fun awesome not even a bit cheese list that won't totally destroy friendships:
Daemon Prince of Chaos with Wings [11 PL, 180pts]: Malefic talon
. Tzeentch: Boon of Change
The Changeling [5 PL, 100pts]: Boon of Change
+ Troops +
Horrors [5 PL, 32pts]: Blue Horror, 9x Pair of Brimstone Horrors
Horrors [5 PL, 32pts]: Blue Horror, 9x Pair of Brimstone Horrors
Horrors [5 PL, 32pts]: Blue Horror, 9x Pair of Brimstone Horrors
Horrors [5 PL, 32pts]: Blue Horror, 9x Pair of Brimstone Horrors
Horrors [5 PL, 32pts]: Blue Horror, 9x Pair of Brimstone Horrors
Horrors [5 PL, 32pts]: Blue Horror, 9x Pair of Brimstone Horrors
+ Heavy Support +
Burning Chariot [5 PL, 98pts]
Burning Chariot [5 PL, 98pts]
++ Total: [100 PL, 998pts] ++
Thanks for reading my drivel and I look forward to your input/discussion
Edit 374: Captains log, star date 95360.79... it has been a troubling mission, but we successfully learned the intricacies of, and established communication with, the spoiler tag.
This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at 2017/10/04 20:17:44
rvd1ofakind wrote: You do not choose the deployment type. You roll for it.
Has there been an errata for it? Because that's not what the mission sheet says.
the mission sheet does say that.
I found a copy of the mission online (spoiled for size), but it clearly says the person who puts down the last objective marker choses the map and which zone they are in. It also matches my physical copy. Do you have a digital copy of the rulebook where it may have been updated?
The rule is found on page 216, in the little paragraph under the header: "When playing matched play missions, you must randomly select one of these deployment maps."
~16000 Astra Militarum: 
~1200 | Imperial Knights: 
~2300 | Leagues of Votann: 
~1300 | Tyranids: 
~3400 | Stormcast Eternals: 
~5000 | Kruleboyz: 
~3500 | Lumineth Realm-Lords: 
~700
