Lord of Contagion

[Shockmaster]

I have always mostly been a Casual gamer but due to a mixture of curiosity & me wanting to expand my list of potential opponents, especially with me planning to move abroad later in the year, I have decided I want to give the more competitive side of the game a go too.

 

So to my question for those of you more experienced at this then me, is there any way of making the LoC work in a more serious setting and if so what are your suggestions?

[SkimaskMohawk]

No. There's literally never a time to take one in a serious game. His aura only procs at the start of your turn, and an enemy unit can only take 1 mortal wound from it max. Other than that you have a slow dude with a good melee weapon. So you just take typhus to get that plus being a psycher and buffing poxwalkers.

 

Chaos Lords fill hqs cheaper and the reroll aura is so much more helpful

[Lil Khorne]

Good day, my rotting friend ;) Unfortunately, I have to agree with SkimaskMohawk, but still there is one way for you to play LoC in a more competetive way I'd say. Give him revoltingly resilient warlord trait, his Disgustingly Resilient ability  will be now +4, which really makes him quite unstoppable. That's the thing with LoC, only LoC is able to have full profit from this warlord trait and gain +4 DR (or FNP) with 2+ save and 4++ invulnerable save. Considering you can always heal him D3 wounds - yeah, sounds great, I know :)

 

The thing is, you just drop him in your enemies lines with some blightlords (just for example, you may drop him with whatever you find handy) and try to charge everything you can. I know this plan sounds risky, but it usually works for me. For example, armies with stand-n-shoot tactics would suffer a lot if your LoC will rush into their line, plus you got some front line invaders, like a big pack of poxwalkers, or rhinos with plaguemarines and so on. If one LoC will take most of enemies shooting on himself, then your opponent is probably doomed :) 

[happyslugger]

I played a game not too long ago (casual we do not play competitive) and decided to drop 2 LOC in with the 3 deathshroud.  They were a massive fire magnet and once they hit the lines they wrecked face big time.  But, I doubt that would be optimal in a competitive environment, that being said, I still want to load up my landraider with poxwalkers and throw em at the enemy lol.

Edited January 24, 2018 by happyslugger

[Panzer]

Maybe it's because I never play static gunlines, but I'm really unimpressed by Deathshrouds and LoC walking towards me...

[Newtoncain]

Deep strike him, fire magnet if he fails the 9" charge, which allows other units to move up the field.  Take 2 or 1 + Typhus.

[happyslugger]

Maybe it's because I never play static gunlines, but I'm really unimpressed by Deathshrouds and LoC walking towards me...

I don't walk them, just drop them in.

 

Deathshroud on their own can deal some hurt.  I dropped three in with Typhus against UM's and charged them into a repulsor tank.  Typhus failed but the deathshroud made it and the rest was history.  I think they put out a decent amount of hurt (once there).  3 models, 10 attacks (+ DtFE), hitting on 3s, usually wounding on 2/3s (re-rolling 1s) with -3 AP.  Wish they did flat 3 damage each instead of the d3.

Edited January 24, 2018 by happyslugger

[Shockmaster]

Cheers guys, I did kind of expect that answer, I just thought I would check in case I had missed something.

 

I won't try to use my two LoC's in my attempts at the competitive side of the game, will leave them for my casual games.

[Panzer]

 

Maybe it's because I never play static gunlines, but I'm really unimpressed by Deathshrouds and LoC walking towards me...

I don't walk them, just drop them in.

 

Deathshroud on their own can deal some hurt.  I dropped three in with Typhus against UM's and charged them into a repulsor tank.  Typhus failed but the deathshroud made it and the rest was history.  

 

Yeah I wasn't talking about them walking over the whole board. It's quite unlikely for them pulling off the charge and then non-static units can simply walk away from them. 4" is REALLY slow and even if they advance it's only 5"-6" on average.

[happyslugger]

I agree, half the problem with this army is it's so slow.  I was lucky on that occasion as I rolled 2x6 on my charge roll for them......doesn't happen very often.

 

TBH I just like playing with the models I like, not too worried about winning/losing - just have a laugh.  I think the deathshroud models and the DI lord of contagion are nice models.

[Panzer]

Them being so slow wouldn't be as much of a problem if they had a proper shooting attack. It's the combination of being slow and a melee unit that makes them one of the last things to worry about for me when facing DG. 

They are nice models indeed and I expect to see them a lot in my opponents army considering that we also have GK and BA in our group who do want to get into melee as well. ^^

[happyslugger]

Yea, one of my friends plays UM's and GK and I have in the background a BA army I am slowly building.....so much painting to do lol

[Shockmaster]

A shame they did not just make the LoC the name for a Death Guard Chaos Lord and give him all the options that the Lord offers, they should have done the same with the Malignant Plaguecaster too, give him all the Sorcerer options instead of separate profiles. 

[oreaper84]

for under 120 i think that 1-2 LOCs are a great deepstriking distraction....i need hq's for the supreme command so they fit nice in the list for that. Really pulls the fire from dark reapers when you drop a small footprint single model 9" away

[happyslugger]

I can vouch that 2 of them + 3 deathshroud can tank some firepower lol

[Shockmaster]

In my casual games(which is all my games currently) I use the LoC in the same way some of you guys suggest, as my opponents seem to be scared of him so when he teleports in they focus all their effort on wiping him off the board while ignoring the stuff in my army they should really be scared of.

 

I just wanted to see if he has any place in a more competitive minded list but I did suspect that I was not missing anything that would make him a serious contender as has been said, super slow and purely close combat does not make a good combination.

[Warsmith Annüss]

If LoC had the LoN rule he would be a more viable choice for me.

[Wolf Lord Loki]

And if he did then ther would be absolutely no reason to take a regular lord

[Warsmith Annüss]

I don't think that's true. You're not going to have your LoC hang out with your crawlers. That's what a Lord is for.

[Arkhanist]

You could always take an allied CSM sorcerer that deep strikes in with him so you can warptime the lord of contagion (or a more oddball method such as the CSM chaos familiar strat to give it to another psyker) to increase his chances of making the charge; but then you've likely got something nastier that would benefit from warptime more.

[CMDR_Welles]

I prefer the Lord of Contagion for a few reasons.

 

Mainly, because Typhus shouldnt be everywhere... Just like Mortarion (or any other named character), why are these guys showing up to every battle? Named Characters really should be used for special games, scenarios, and end of campaign type games.

If every game is to have a named character, then they really arent that special anymore... Just because they have points, doesnt mean they should always be used.

 

 

Secondly, a Lord of Contagion isnt a named character, so you can give him your own history and background, as your armies general, he is "you" in the game. You can make him who you want him to be. This goes for any non-named hero type units. It makes me sad that this view of "immersion" has been replaced by optimum...

[SkimaskMohawk]

That's a nice opinion, and all the power to you and others who feel like named characters detract from their personal fluff. But saying they should be only used for narrative purposes as a generalization is wrong. Some units are designed around a named character's special rules (Typhus being the perfect example with Poxwalkers, Marine Characters in 5th unlocking chapter tactics); the game has a come a long way since 3rd where you needed permission to field them. Immersion means different things to different people; I think tanks driving up buildings and shooting behind themselves with fixed weapons is more immersion breaking than a special character being used a lot.

 

Back on topic, there's still no reason to take a LoC over a chaos lord, daemon prince or plaguecaster. He's a cheap anti-elite beatstick, but this isn't the edition for solo anti-elite beatsticks; synergy or lots of damage is far more important. Chaos lord is dirt cheap and provides rerolls to hit, plague caster lets you pump out damage with smite and plague wind and his aura explosion, Daemon Prince combines the casting and support potential with speed and 7 attacks.

[bozo69pd]

If your opponent is bunched up in his deployment zone you can give your LoC the Fugaris helm to give him a 10" mortal wound aura, then try to deep strike him smart and advance to be giving out as many mortal wounds as possible. I probably would not want to risk him as my warlord like this, more of a cheap 117 point tough bomb.

 

He is great in low points games though.

[SkimaskMohawk]

It's not everything in 7" (or 10" with helm) takes mortal wounds. It's all death guard in 7"/10" can trigger mortal wounds while they're within 1". And even then, it's at the start of your turn, so the enemy needs to be locked in combat and not have just fallen back.

[bozo69pd]

It's not everything in 7" (or 10" with helm) takes mortal wounds. It's all death guard in 7"/10" can trigger mortal wounds while they're within 1". And even then, it's at the start of your turn, so the enemy needs to be locked in combat and not have just fallen back.

Well I guess that just makes him worthless then. Too bad Morty gets shot up so bad, his aura is badass.