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.

Elucidate: Why is the index invalid, precisely? Your argument seems predicated on this theory. There is at least one entry in that index table that still has relevance as it was not updated into the DG codex. That's the very thing we are discussing right now.

What rule invalidates Forces of the Death Guard specifically? Where is this rule? Page citation, if you please? Why do you assume the army selection rules from the index are invalid? We use the updated codex entries and costs, but there is no reason to have to 'import' anything, all the rules for army selection in both venues are completely valid.

As you say, p. 116 restricts legion access, we all know this. This rule prevents DG Obliterators, Heldrakes, Havocs, and others. In a rules based system, however, exceptions will exist. Exceptions exist to make a break from standard rules in corner case scenarios. There happens to be a very specific and using your own word, explicit permission given in the index to take a DP. Has anything explicitly revoked this permission? Your rules citation, under this interpretation applies to all CSM datasheets, save one. The DP in question, and only because of this strange rules interaction.

If legion restriction is a general rule as provided by the codex, then I am applying an exception to that rule. See earlier in thread for order of operations. What I am asking you to do, again, is explain why the exception does not work, as of yet I have seen no rules citations given that prevent such interactions from taking place.

I'm not trying to be difficult, it just seems we keep pointing at the reference on p.116. I feel I've already provided an adequate counter to that. Please, disprove me with rules as written.

edit: Yep, that would indeed have simplified the issue. (I imagine the rage of the general community when their legacy models are no longer valid is what keeps GW from doing so. Enough DG players raged at the loss of oblits, bikers, etc. already )
edit: @Captyn_Bob we still end up with Palanquin Sorcerers for Nurgle Daemonkin builds for the Dark Hereticus power and pan-daemon synergy. It takes all the Chaos ingredients to really make DG cook.

All we really have to go on is the designers commentary flowchart, which is brutally simple.

"Does your model have a datasheet in a codex"
Yes it does. Two in fact, so you have to wilfully ignore the death guard codex and deside you want use the index one.

Then we are directed to " use the codex version of your models dataheet"
So we are told by the rules to use the codex version of the datasheet. RAW is simple

Should we interpret this as " does your model with a specific faction keyword have a datasheet of this name in a codex"
Maybe. But that's not enough to convince anyone to allow what is obviously shenanigans.

My model (Name: Daemon Prince, Keywords: NURGLE, DEATH GUARD) doesn't have a codex datasheet, so I use the Index one.

 BaconCatBug wrote:
My model (Name: Daemon Prince, Keywords: NURGLE, DEATH GUARD) doesn't have a codex datasheet, so I use the Index one.

Precisely. Wilfully ignoring the Daemon Prince of Nurgle datasheet to gain an unintended advantage- and creating a new and undocumented definition of model to do so.

Your logic requires Blood Angels to use the Rhino from Codex: Dark Angels and thus never be able to have models embark.

This fails the "common sense" test a lot of people like to throw about, in addition to not following the rules.

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Your logic requires Blood Angels to use the Rhino from Codex: Dark Angels and thus never be able to have models embark.

This fails the "common sense" test a lot of people like to throw about, in addition to not following the rules.

Those both have codex's so you don't get a problem following the flowchart. Your point works for space wolves tho, as they haven't had their codex yet. In that instance I would agree there is no Space wolves rhino in a codex.
Its the definition of your model as a Daemon prince with mark of nurgle, rather than a daemon prince of nurgle, that's wilful misinterpretation.
But as ever, finding one dubious example doesn't allow you to make up your own rules. Certainly not to the level that another player would be expected to take them seriously.

Vortenger wrote:
As you say, p. 116 restricts legion access, we all know this. This rule prevents DG Obliterators, Heldrakes, Havocs, and others. In a rules based system, however, exceptions will exist. Exceptions exist to make a break from standard rules in corner case scenarios. There happens to be a very specific and using your own word, explicit permission given in the index to take a DP. Has anything explicitly revoked this permission?

Has anything revoked that permission? Yes, actuslly. According to the Index, <LEGION> can be replaced with DEATH GUARD, albeit with some special conditions stated on page 57. However, Codex: CSM is more restrictive - it explicitly states that you cannot take DEATH GUARD in place of <LEGION> for datasheets in that book. Nothing you have provided gets around that - by taking DEATH GUARD you are breaking a rule that didn't exist when the Index was released (C: CSM p116 as before). Show me where it states that the Daemon Prince is an exception to that rule. It's not in the Index - it can't be, because the Codex didn't exist when that was printed.

It seems to me that as well as ignoring the fact that there is a specific datasheet designed to allow a Death Guard Daemon Prince (y'know, the one in the codex), you're also wilfully ignoring the fact that the meaning of <LEGION> has changed between Index and Codex.

The problem I have when updating the BS files for Chaos (or for any of the other data maintainers), is that there is always someone who will have a different interpretation of the rules to you.

My personal interpretation is that the "Daemon Prince of Nurgle" is the only type of Daemon Prince which Death Guard can take. It can't take a Warp Bolter and can only use Contagion powers.

However, an argument can be made that the "Daemon Prince" which appears in the Index is still a valid option because it's a different unit due to the name change.

Often, it's easier to support a option in BS until GW specifically forbid it.

TLDR; Battlescribe are not GW, we just read their rules and do the best we can.

Thank you everyone for your input.

There is what appears to be an unintended rules consequences and we are discussing it. No one is willfully disregarding anything. Do you like less options for your army or more? I like more, personally. If discussing a rules hiccup is shenanigans to you and yours, I would probably not play play at such a table. I like academic debate. Odd little corner cases such as these offer easy subject material to debate.

BCB's method seems a good method that does not hit on any logical hitches. It isn't making up rules, it checks all the boxes, and leaves no strings attached. It does not seem intuitive, but much in 8th falls short in that regard.

@Bob, you are probably right in that the flowchart wording is restrictive rather than permissive. I disagree that the two daemon princes are the same, even if that was the intention behind it. Having given them separate names means separate datasheets. Moreover, Daemon Prince of Nurgle is a specific model. There are three unnamed DP's in the game, and DG wants to use all of them. I didn't design the same unit into 3 slightly differentiated datasheets, but I do wish to find a way to efficiently use them, all the same.

@Aelyn, I've found our exchange amusing because after all this, you are right. You just never cited why. My assertions to using Forces of the Death Guard would work save for one sentence in the flowchart I'd passed over. We must use the current codex rules for the datasheet entry, that passage is what I missed. It makes everything you said true, and is the reason you are correct. I apologize for having not noted it sooner.

To summarize, either one cannot take a CSM DP with DG at all or they are relegated to using the index version (my personal vote). Well, we have come a ways since the OP.

Vortenger wrote:
BCB's method seems a good method that does not hit on any logical hitches. It isn't making up rules, it checks all the boxes, and leaves no strings attached. It does not seem intuitive, but much in 8th falls short in that regard.

It's the advantage of being a RaW purist, you're always right. The RaW is the RaW, so you're automatically in the right on that angle. If GW issue an FAQ solidifying RaW, you're right. If GW issue a special snowflake FAQ that overrides RaW, then you're still right because it forced GW to change the rule.

That method does require you to answer 'no' to the question
"Does your model have rules in a codex" knowing full well that there are rules for Nurgle daemon princes in 3 codices.
But if you think that is acceptable, cool. I don't think I could persuade my opponents of that, as much as I'd like to.

To understand why I've persisted in this thread, I've been sitting on this model for a bit and really want to use him. I play DG legion and would rather find rules to support using my models rather than faking an Alpha Legion detachment to shoehorn him and my cultists into better rules. That feels far more like shenanigans to me. I had thought I'd found a way to use the rules to do so. My method was incorrect.


I'm not gonna lie, I want to shoot that warp bolter.

Totally understandable

Captyn_Bob wrote:
That method does require you to answer 'no' to the question
"Does your model have rules in a codex" knowing full well that there are rules for Nurgle daemon princes in 3 codices.
But if you think that is acceptable, cool. I don't think I could persuade my opponents of that, as much as I'd like to.

My model is called "Daemon Prince" and has the NURGLE and DEATH GUARD keywords.

Where in a codex can I find that model?

Death guard codex of course.

A models datasheet name isn't indelibly etched into it's existence. It's a judgement made by the player. Nor do we have any rules basis to judge a named datasheet based on its inherent keywords (but this is good practice in disputes, so I think it's fine here.)

Captyn_Bob wrote:
Death guard codex of course.

I am looking at my Death Guard codex and I cannot seem to find the datasheet? Do you have a page reference for me?

Hilarious.
Let's be more realistic. I go on the webstore and buy a model which looks cool.
It's called 'Nurgle Daemon Prince '.
Where do I find the rules for my new model? I want to use it in my death guard army, and i have bought the codex.

Captyn_Bob wrote:
Hilarious.
Let's be more realistic. I go on the webstore and buy a model which looks cool.
It's called 'Nurgle Daemon Prince '.
Where do I find the rules for my new model? I want to use it in my death guard army, and i have bought the codex.

I see you didn't answer my question.

Can you please give me a page reference for the datasheet for "Daemon Prince" in the Death Guard codex? I have read it front to back twice and cannot find it.

Page 70. Because we define our units based on judgement of their qualities, and are guided to use the codex over the index.
Now answer my question.

Captyn_Bob wrote:
Page 70. Because we define our units based on judgement of their qualities, and are guided to use the codex over the index.
Now answer my question.

I am sorry, it might be a mistake in the epub but I don't see any units called Daemon Prince on that page. Can someone with a physical copy confirm that this is the case for them too?

Sigh, you are very close to finding a convincing argument, which is all anyone really wants, but the facetiousness means I'm out.

Captyn_Bob wrote:
Sigh, you are very close to finding a convincing argument, which is all anyone really wants, but the facetiousness means I'm out.

I am being 100% sincere. There is no datasheet called "Daemon Prince" anywhere in the Death Guard codex. Thus if I wish to take a model called "Daemon Prince" which has both the keywords NURGLE and DEATH GUARD, the latest rules would be in Index: Chaos.

Captyn_Bob wrote:
Hilarious.
Let's be more realistic. I go on the webstore and buy a model which looks cool.
It's called 'Nurgle Daemon Prince '.
Where do I find the rules for my new model? I want to use it in my death guard army, and i have bought the codex.

Well, in that case you're using a new model which supposedly conforms to the codex and would match the options in it. For anybody with an older Daemon Prince model, however, who wants Nurgle and Death Guard keywords and has a warp bolter, then you can go to the index for Daemon Prince like GW tells you to for older models with different items no longer supported in the Codex. If I bought a brand new Autarch it would match up with what's in Craftworlds, but if I have an older model with other stuff like Reaper Launcher, then I would use the Index entry. Citing buying a brand new model is not being reasonable at all when talking about Codex vs Index, since that had been set up for older models.

I must agree with the posters above me. If the Daemon Prince is different than a Daemon Prince of Chaos, then so too must a Daemon Prince of Nurgle be its own specific entry. This is more evident than with the former example because this datasheet has its own unique model. Using another model is using a counts-as model. No one seems to mind using a Daemon Prince of Chaos to stand-in, but there it is. This is further supported by Reecius and the LVO team as evidenced here. https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/60/733325.page (12th and 13th post)

If DP of Nurgle is it's own unique entry, then the index remains the most recent rules for the Daemon Prince datasheet that DG can get. We can't take the CSM Daemon Prince, but we can take a Daemon Prince. It's almost like the datasheet is itself a wargear option.

That all adds up to me.

So. Lose out on Digustingly Resilient all for a Warp bolter and a cheeky way to add Heretic Astartes powers into your Death Guard? If it requires a rules argument and a flow chart to work... It probably doesent.

They could have just as easily added a vanilla Daemon Prince to the list with the Lord and Sorcerer but they didn't.

 Nightlord1987 wrote:
So. Lose out on Digustingly Resilient all for a Warp bolter and a cheeky way to add Heretic Astartes powers into your Death Guard? If it requires a rules argument and a flow chart to work... It probably doesent.

They could have just as easily added a vanilla Daemon Prince to the list with the Lord and Sorcerer but they didn't.

It doesn't matter what they did or didn't do. The RaW is clear and we have explicit permission do use the Index Daemon Prince with NURGLE and DEATH GUARD keywords.

If GW rules didn't require a rules argument and a flow chart to work, this forum wouldn't exist, and there would not be, you know, AN ACTUAL GW FLOW CHART!

Argue with your opponent. Most people are actually cool with allowing bizzare antics rather than the anonymous strangers of the Internet. Losing out on DR is a pretty big disadvantage I'd be glad for my opponent to use.

 Nightlord1987 wrote:
Argue with your opponent. Most people are actually cool with allowing bizzare antics rather than the anonymous strangers of the Internet. Losing out on DR is a pretty big disadvantage I'd be glad for my opponent to use.

Yeah, just because it's legal to do it might not mean it's the best way to do it. If someone really, really wanted a Warp Bolter and Heretic Astartes powers and was willing to sacrifice having Disgustingly Resilient to get it, then more power to them.

 doctortom wrote:
Yeah, just because it's legal to do it might not mean it's the best way to do it.

If it's the legal way then it's the only way to do it. There are no other avenues or choices. If you're not going to play the legal way then you're not playing the same game that your opponent expects you to be playing.