Daemonic Deathguard

[Lucio]

Decided to start a new army this year, and since Nurgle's popularity is on the rise, I've joined in.

The aim of my army is to use the majority of the force for both Age of Sigmar and WH40k, so is going to be a very daemon heavy force, featuring a lot of conversion work to give a feel to the model's that fits both games.

For example, my Plaguebearers are going to be kitbashed with Dryads to pick up the theme of the Garden of Nurgle, but then feature metallic components within their composition.

What Daemon units from the DEathguard codex do people recomend at the moment?

[happyslugger]

Hi,

 

Drones, plagueburst crawler's and Mortarian are the main daemon units I use.

[Dark Bjoern]

Yeah, Bloat-drohnes, crawlers in combination with Epidemus. Absolutly nasty. I saw a guy at my LGS who tabled a 2000 points tyranid horde in round 4 only with a 18 model strong army. 2 DP, Epidemus, Plaguecaster, 2x3 Nurglings, 6 Bloat-drones, 2 crawlers.

[Prot]

Excuse my ignorance but why do so many Deathguard armies use Epidemus, and is it still really a a Deathguard army or,ore of a Daemon army with a squad of Plague marines in it?

[Lucio]

Actually my force really isn't a Deathguard army, it's intended to be a Nurgle daemon army. Not even sure if I'll include any Plague Marines at this stage, may just stick to choices with either Daemon keyword or Poxwalkers

 

However, having a detachment with the Deathguard keyword opens up some useful Stratigies, so thematically I'll have a Deathguard Daemon Prince or Deathguard sorcerer on a plannequin leading one detatchment. I also toyed with the idea of fielding 3 daemon princes, having them as a rare set of tripplets inducted into the Deathguard,

[Dark Bjoern]

Excuse my ignorance but why do so many Deathguard armies use Epidemus, and is it still really a a Deathguard army or,ore of a Daemon army with a squad of Plague marines in it?

Simple and plain because of the synergy. Epidemus and those lovely basic Bloat-drones are so f*cking efficient. The DPs and the Caster can smite something to death and/or boost some of the drones and Epidemus effects doesn´t have a limited range, every nurgle daemon on the whole table is affected.

Against this list our top SW player gave up in round 3.

[Prot]

I guess I don't understand his effects, but it does sound like you're very specific to which units gel with him. I guess in the other thread someone was saying you need to have  a largely 'daemon' army to make it work. So traditional DG units probably don't help.

[SkimaskMohawk]

Basically every time a nurgle daemon unit kills another unit you check his table and receive cumulative buffs 0-1 nothing, 2 rerolls hits of 1, 3 move +1, 4 str +1, 5 T +1, 6 attacks +1, 7+ reroll DG of 1s. These bonuses are only applied to nurgle daemons.

 

Toughness is probably the most annoying, with both rerolls potentially being the weakest depending on daemon princes/mortarion/plague spitters and the whole 5% increase in survivability.

 

Honestly I don't think he's amazing as he was in the dawn of 6th; the best lists for him are extremely good regardless of his presence right now

[Kilofix]

I think it’s all about the stacking of buffs.

 

+1 Str from Epi doesn’t sound like much, until you also stack a Herald’s or a Psychic +1 Str. And then all of a sudden your Blight Drones are S8, auto hit, reroll wounds, and double damage from the Loci.

 

Epi is easy because his buffs are automatic (don’t need to cast) and board wide (don’t need him to be close).