DoA vs Nurgle based Daemons, looking for advice.

[*Riken*]

Hey everyone,

 

I'm fairly new to the forums but Ive been playing for BA since third in that time frame I have never once played against a Chaos Daemon army even though I have a friend who been collecting them for a couple of years now. Just recently said friend told me he wants to test out his Nurgle based list at 1750 points, naturally I said sure as I wont ever turn down a chance to purge chaos filth. With that being said I play a DoA based army and have limited access to tanks (I could proxy rhinos as Baals/Preds/Vindies but I'd rather not) and have very few ideas on how to counter his army. So I come to you guys with any tips, thoughts, or advice on fighting Nurgle based daemons.

 

What I know for sure he will run:

Ku'gath (possible normal Great Unclean One, possibly both)

3 Squads of plague bearers

3 Daemon Princes with marks of Nurgle and unknown for powers or other gear.

 

The other models i know he has but am sure if he would run are:

Keeper of Secrets

2 Squads of Daemonettes

2 Squads of 5 Seekers.

 

I know he has more but hasn't told me what.

 

What I have access to is everything BA can field minus tanks, pods,

I was thinking of running a my typical 1750 DoA list but if anyone sees room for improvement let me know it will look something like

 

Dante (unsure of his value against an army that enters via deepstrike other then using his mask on Ku'gath? Possibly replace with Meph/Sang or second librarian?)

Librarian with JP, Unleash Rage and unsure (Normally this would be shield but I don't see Daemons doing alot of shooting so maybe Blood boil to peel wounds off MCs?)

Honor Guard with JP and 4 Melta Guns

 

3 Sanguinary Priests with Jump Packs

 

3 Assault Squads with 2 Melta guns and Fists

 

7 Death Company with JP + Lemartes (this was one tweak to my normal list I figured a good hammer unit that can take a real beating in return massive point sink mind you, possibly replace with 10 VV with a fist or 2?)

 

If stay with Death company and Dante puts me with 75 Points to spare so I guess I'd give the DC 2 Fists leaving me with 15 points.

With VV I have 155 to spare, no idea what on mind you.

 

My plan with the list above would be

Opt for second turn and wait to see what half deploys, with my army being faster (exception being seekers) I can stay out of the threat range of his army and charge on my next turn. Use the Honor guard + Dante to Melt his MCs down with melta fire and normal Assault squads to clean up the plague bearers (No idea how well plague bearers do in combat from there stats I think they are a tarpit at best). Then Use my Death Company to hopefully ruin Ku'gaths day.

 

What worries me is the amount of high Toughness and high Wound models I'll be up against and weather or not I can bring them down in time.

 

Well if any one sees major flaws in my list or plan please point them out, otherwise tips/thoughts and advice is much appreciated.

 

-Riken

[ashen]

As you have mentioned, definately deploy on the board, I think that nurgle daemons could be an ok match for you. The main reason being that only half his army will come down initially, in this case use all of your force to strike at this half, then go on to mop up the remnants of his force. I think meph could be a much better option than dante, he will usually be strength 10, so wounding those nurgle daemons on a 2+.

Other than that, try for lots of melta guns to knock those monstrous creatures down a wound or 2 so your other units can then mop up.

Remember, its about force concentration.

Cheers,

Ashen

[DV8]

Against Daemons, Dante isn't exactly the greatest character to take. Unless he has Heralds, Greater Daemons aren't Independent Characters and thus can't be oogie-boogied by Dante's Mask. Coupled with the fact that you aren't taking Sanguinary Guard, and are starting on the table, the only benefit Dante would give is Hit and Run. His stats and gear are "meh" as a character and you'd be better off spending the points on another squad. I'd take Mephiston as the HQ and go to town with Unleash Rage and Sanguine Sword. Wings of Sanguinius if you must, but let him come to you.

 

A healthy block of Death Company with Lemartes will do well against his Plaguebearers (particularily re-rolling wounds against T5), but be careful about being tied down against anything that ignores your armor.

 

Again, meltaguns and plasmaguns/pistols will knock off wounds from MCs before you run in to finish the charge.

 

You can probably also save points by taking less Sanguinary Priests (is your army big enough to really need 3?) Just stay a little closer together and you should be okay with 1 or 2.

 

Lastly, if you're using pure DoA you lack firepower and staying power to go toe to toe with Daemons, so kill what you can, but focus on the mission/objectives. If it's Kill Points, play Kill Point denial. Just because you want to annihilate your opponent's army doesn't mean you have to.

 

EDIT: Don't forget that the Daemon first wave comes in First Turn, and everything else is Reserves as normal. Plus all Daemon units will enter via Deep Strike which means they can't reach combat the turn they enter play. Use that to your advantage.

 

 

DV8

[BOBMAKENZIE]

I saw this great tau tactica once where you make these perfect little circles in your army so people will try and deep strike into them and 1/9th of the time die. Clearly this is the greatest tactic ever. :blush:

[*Riken*]

DV8 you bring up great points about Dante ill sub him out for mephiston and I think your right about three priests as well ill run 2 and free up enough points for extra war gear or perhaps a furioso(not really doa but causes lots of pain).

 

Thanks for the advice the game is tonight and ill so we'll see how it goes.

[Father Mapple]

When I play against Daemons, I make sure to get as many rerolls or raw number of dice as possible. Sheer number of hits is important since they usually only have a 5+ invul save. You won't get tons of benefits from power weapons unless they're fists for the higher STR versus MC's. You might want to do Hammers instead of fists since the hammers would stun the MCs and you're not going to double them out. It'll be really important to get STR 5 from furious charge against anything with Nurgle marks.

 

Mephiston is a better choice for the reasons mentioned above. Also because he will go first (esp. with Furious Charge if you can get him close to a priest) and use his Force Weapon on a MC that doesn't have eternal warrior (which might be all of them, if I'm thinking of Daemon Princes). Either way, he has rerolls at STR 10 most probably, but even then his STR of 6 will still have a chance to wound against T7 Nurgle Daemon Princes. You can still get an Honor Guard, just not one to put him inside of.

 

Unleash rage is good for your other librarian, but add either Sword of Sanguinus for STR 10 hits, or Blood Lance to hit multiple models lined up, especially after deep striking if they roll their run really badly. You will need two psychic hoods to stop all the psychic powers the enemy's Daemon Princes and other units will be using.

 

Deploy on the board as mentioned above, and let them go first. When they Deep Strike, you want to charge that first turn if you can, since they won't. Be careful of the huge cavalry threat range of Seekers!

 

And a lot of people forget about bolt pistols, but they can wound! I had a 10 man assault squad shoot into a larger group of Bloodletters wounding a few, meltaguns doubling out 1, then Furious Charge into them, kill a few more, and since it happened at I5, I only lost 3 or so on the return swings since there weren't that many left, and the additional wounds in combat killed the rest of the Fearless Daemons. Then I consolidated away from the second group. I know you're not fighting Blood letters but this little inspiring anecdote should show you to not forget about your bolt pistols and the additional wounds from Fearless at the end of combat!

[BOBMAKENZIE]

There are no psychic powers in the Daemon book so no point to Psychic Hoods. Additionally all Daemons are immune to instant death in that book.

[Judaz]

When I play against Daemons, I make sure to get as many rerolls or raw number of dice as possible. Sheer number of hits is important since they usually only have a 5+ invul save. You won't get tons of benefits from power weapons unless they're fists for the higher STR versus MC's. You might want to do Hammers instead of fists since the hammers would stun the MCs and you're not going to double them out. It'll be really important to get STR 5 from furious charge against anything with Nurgle marks.

 

Doesn't power weapons take care of the Feel no pain that a Nurgle army surely will have a lot of?

[DV8]

When I play against Daemons, I make sure to get as many rerolls or raw number of dice as possible. Sheer number of hits is important since they usually only have a 5+ invul save. You won't get tons of benefits from power weapons unless they're fists for the higher STR versus MC's. You might want to do Hammers instead of fists since the hammers would stun the MCs and you're not going to double them out. It'll be really important to get STR 5 from furious charge against anything with Nurgle marks.

 

Doesn't power weapons take care of the Feel no pain that a Nurgle army surely will have a lot of?

 

It does, but the amount of points you'd have to spend to get enough Power Weapons to sufficiently tear through a Nurgle Daemon unit/army would be obscene. And the only units that can field lots of Power Weapons would be Terminators, Sanguinary Guard, Vanguard, Death Company, or Honor Guard, all of which would end up costing MORE than the Nurgle Units they're designed to face.

 

Plaguebearers are only 16 points a pop. With base T5, a 5+ inv save and Feel No Pain, they are some of the most resilient units in the game, for almost nothing in points (by comparison). They are also Troops, which make them a down-right pain because they can score objectives and are near impossible to shift at 15-20 strong. The key is to not get tied down in combat with them (because it will take you forever to tear through them, especially with pure DoA). There are different ways to handle them, and it all depends on what you take.

 

If you take the shooting route, Vindicators will clear out swathes of them easy. Devastators with Plasma Cannons will do great too. Otherwise don't waste your firepower, since Plaguebearers, beyond absorbing hits, can't contribute anything to the battle other than in combat.

 

If you take the combat route, pile in as many higher Initiative hits as possible, and force the odds against him. He'll fail enough to lose and eventually you'll whittle his unit down to nothing. But again you want to avoid being tar-pitted (because that's what Plaguebearers do), because it pulls your units out of the game. Kill the rest of his army first, and then focus on a Plaguebearer unit at a time.

 

If you take the objective route (I recommend this), kill all the other threats in the Daemon army, and then focus on the objective(s) you want, and contest the rest. Remember locking a scoring unit in combat prevents them from scoring/contesting whilst they're still locked in combat, so charging a Plaguebearer unit on the last turn is a great way to deny them an objective.

 

That being said, Assault Terminators would be a rock-solid "anvil" or "hammer" unit to use against Daemons. Dual Lightning Claws with Furious Charge (and a Chaplain) will allow them to tear through units (particularly Nurgle-oriented), and TH/SS Terminators with Feel No Pain make a rock-solid anvil unit to soak up hits.

 

As BobMakenzie points out, the entire Daemon army has Eternal Warrior, so S10 and Force Weapons have no effect. You'll have to strip every last wound off their carcasses. They also have no psychic powers, simply "abilities" that happen to function in some ways like psychic powers from the Chaos Space Marine book (i.e. Tzeentch's Doombolt or Bolt of Change).

 

 

DV8

[BOBMAKENZIE]

As BobMakenzie points out, the entire Daemon army has Eternal Warrior, so S10 and Force Weapons have no effect. You'll have to strip every last wound off their carcasses. They also have no psychic powers, simply "abilities" that happen to function in some ways like psychic powers from the Chaos Space Marine book (i.e. Tzeentch's Doombolt or Bolt of Change).

 

*Bro Fist*

 

 

I've been pondering it more and the more I think a Vindicator would be good. For killing plague bearers as they come down with limited return fire and a squad of plague bearers is as tough as a unit of T5 Marines to shift (tougher bcause of the Invul in some ways too).

 

The big boys are harder to make a call on and might even be the best fodder for focused assaults. 2-3 Units with Pfists and a priest nearby should drag the big boys down.

 

Assuming T6 and a 3+ or 3+ Equivalent (Ie: FNP and a 5+) 1 Wnd on one of these is roughly 36 Normal str 4 attacks to remove. Ponder on that one abit.

[Drachnon]

Last time I faced Nurgle daemons I lost pretty bad, though it was a 2 v 2 match with IG ally on my side (an assault army and a stand and shoot army are not the greatest combo in history) if I had to fight them against I would stock up on lightning claws for sergeants perhaps so LC assault terminators. Not only do you benefit a lot because of the reroll to wound you'll also ignore their feel no pain which can be annoying.

[*Riken*]

Well thanks for the advice everyone it was helpful and led to a great victory in the name of Sanguinius.

 

I spent the lecture half of todays class thinking up ideas and changing my list over and over, it was a productive day.

 

What i ended up running with

 

The Sanguinor

Mephiston

 

2 Sanguinary Priests with jump packs

 

3 Assault squad with 2 meltas and a powerfist each

 

10 foot slogging death company with a thunder hammer

 

DC dread with blood claws and a heavy flamer.

 

Not ideal i know, but man the DC + Dread and HQ combos were absolute game breakers very little was left in the wake of there charge. The Sanguinor and Mephiston ran as an army of 2 wrecked everything they touched. There kill total was Epidemus + 14 Plaguebearers, 1 Daemon price, and another 7man squad of plague bearers while the only 1 wound was caused to meph and by a perils of the warp of all things. The Death company ran with a group of assault marines which ended up killing a great unclean one after 2 rounds of combat then another 7man squad of plague bearers. While the DC dread and another assault squad finished off a daemon prince and the DC dread ate some nurglings (not really a feat of strength but still fun causing 14 wounds on the charge).

 

What the Daemon list looked like. Sorry i dont remember the names of all the abilities.

 

Great Unclean One with flame template attack, defensive grenades and something else which i dont remember

Epidemus

 

14 Plague bearers grouped with Epidemus and an icon

 

3 squads of 7 Plague bearers

 

2 squads of 5 nurglings

 

3 Daemon princes with Wings, 3+ armor save, defensive grenades and marks of nurgle and shooting attack that is S5 AP3 Assault 3

 

We played an objectives game with 4 objectives. The game ended turn 5 with me holding 3 of them and him with 2 wounds left on one squad of nurglings and nothing else. Total lossed on my end were 3 Death company, 8 assault marines from trying to take down a Daemon Prince on there own and 1 more dead from the flame template from the great unclean one. Nothing like purging daemon filth. If anyone wants a bat rep i could make one but i think that summed it up. Once again that for the advice B&C.

[BOBMAKENZIE]

Is there anything you would change about how you approached the game or list build in the future? Do you think your list could take on all comers?

[Chaplain Admetus]

Sounds like a solid win, congrats :). Just something I wanted to add to the discussion even though it might be a bit late, BOBMAKENZIE's first comment is actually very similar to how I deal with daemons - drop zone denial. If you deploy on the board and take first turn, you can spread your army out a fair bit, taking advantage of the BA speed, and box off certain areas of the board. If you're spread out enough, then you can effectively dictate where the daemon player deploys his initial units, unless they take a risk. Effectively, you can box off and destroy individual elements, and not even let some of the nastier stuff onto the board if the deepstrike mishap table comes up in your favour.

[*Riken*]

Is there anything you would change about how you approached the game or list build in the future? Do you think your list could take on all comers?

 

 

I felt the list in general way fairly solid for that game and I would use it again for sure. How it would fair against an all comers list, I think it would be decent though the serious lack of anti tank weapon is an issue. To turn it into an all comers style build it would probably drop the DC dread and maybe even the death company in favor of a melts gun honor guard squad not sure though.

 

Looking back at the game i would have changed how I deployed in sort of castled up with mephiston and the sanguinor in the middle and death company and the dread on either side of them. I think spacing them out would have been better to deny the daemons a very open deployment zone. The other thing I would change I not trying to take illiterate a da non prince with a single assault squad that was fairly stupid of me as I lost most the squash till the DC dread arrived.