Do you include Daemons?

[Bloody Legionnaire]

I know including daemons in an Army composition along with a CSM force is essentially chaos soup, but I feel like any Word Bearers list should have 2 things in it Dark Apostles and Daemons. It is completely fluffy. 

For you guys that like to have Daemons in your Army, how do you like to do it? Reinforcement via summoning or in detachments? 

Do you typically find yourself including undivided daemons in order to be fluffy, or mono god to try and be more competitive? 

I feel like CSM offer enough of the things that C:Daemons is lacking in that going undivided and thus missing out on the loci isn't a big deal. Initially I was trying to include a battalion of Khorne Daemons in my list and then summon in whatever other flavor of Daemons I needed to depending on the game situation (the tactical flexibility of summoning is what's really appealing to me). Now, I'm considering just having a Battalion of undivided daemons and rolling that way. 

[N1SB]

Yes, I do something like this with Death Guard and Nurgle Daemons, so while I don't play Word Bearers with Daemons, my experiences are still pretty much in-line with your thoughts.  I'll share what I actually use, but also what I might do in your case.

 

 

+++ Overall Thesis: Imperial soup is out of fad, but Chaos soup still on the menu +++

 

 

Whereas Loyalists tend to be more "puritan" single-Codex now due to some trade-offs for souping (like Loyalist Marines losing their Super Doctrines and wotnot), Chaos soup still makes sense because, like you say, in MOST cases we don't lose much.  The Loci system for MOST Daemons are lacklustre...but I think the Khorne one just happens to be good for what they do.

 

You're thinking of flexibility and you're right, and in my case I use that to complement my forces: Chaos Marines and Chaos Daemons can do things the other can't.  For what I use, I don't happen to use Summoning though.

 

 

+++ What I Do: Nurglings + SOME Death Guard (or Chaos Knights) +++

 

 

In your case, you're thinking of CSM 1st then Daemons, in my case, I actually started with Nurglings and built my way around them, it was an unorthodox approach, but it's six-of-one-a-half-dozen-of-the-other.  So I'll just share what I did.

 

I went mono-god not just because of fluff, though of course this was fluffy, but because it made sense for what I wanted to do.

 

Nurglings, imho, are an underrated unit.  Cheap Wounds that are very survivable (based on how frustrated my opponents get trying to take down just 1 unit), so they could tarpit an enemy until a big unit swoops in to smash them, soak overwatch, or just be objective sitters, very versatile.  Then they're also Infiltrators, that's huge.

 

Then I tapped into Death Guard for stuff I couldn't do...mainly for Daemon Princes with better Relics and Warlord Traits than what Daemons had.  Sharing the Faction Keyword <Nurgle>, I could even smush them together into the same Detachment when I want to.  And here's where I really agree with you on things like the Loci.

 

The Nurgle Loci for my Nurglings is something I lose out on in that case, but it's a tiny trade-off.

 

The loss of the Death Guard's Legion Tactic, Relentless Advance with shooting, WOULD be an issue if I relied on mobile shooting.  But I happen to use things like Winged Daemon Princes or would be interested in things like the Foul Blightspawn (Flamer weapon Elite guy) who auto-hits anyway, or in the future maybe a Dakka Dread (a 5+ FNP Leviathan) which in 9th don't need this rule anymore (since all Vehicles ignore the penalties of fire & move).  In fact with the Bolter Drill rule their Legion Tactic became a lot less significant, I feel.

 

So that's how I thought about my army composition.  I don't summon, because the Nurglings infiltrate and I actually want them to get shot out (so other thing's don't get shot, they're almost like a Distraction Carnifex but tiny).  I can put them into a different Detachment, I don't even have to...but I know what I'm getting into mostly.

 

(For the past year or so I actually have been running 2 separate Detachments, Nurgle Daemons + Chaos Knights, no Death Guard, though.)

 

 

+++ What I Considered: Word Bearers + Bloodletter Bomb +++

 

 

I really like this idea, and I honestly considered something like CSM + Bloodletter Bomb for awhile.

 

Brother, I know your main is World Eaters, so I really like how you were thinking of Khorne Daemons with Word Bearers instead.  Because whereas in my case Daemons and Death Guard were complementary, World Eaters with more melee Daemons would be redundant.  Makes perfect sense for Word Bearers, though.

 

Even if you didn't mention it, the main Daemons thing I want to have was just a Bloodletters Bomb.  30 Bloodletters with a Khorne Daemon HQ, Deep Strike for 3 Command Points.  The Khorne Loci to re-roll that charge is QUITE important.  Thus, in this case, I think the Loci is worth preserving.

 

Can you summon that?  I think so, it's just another way of getting them in-close via Reserves before they can charge, but I THINK I'd rather just spend CP to Deep Strike them.  And because it's relatively easy to plug in the Detachment (it's a Patrol, 1 Troop of max-size Bloodletters and a Khorne HQ), I'd probably do just that.

 

So whereas I really didn't care about the Loci for my Nurgle list, I think I would care for this one.

 

Now for fluff considerations, would it make sense for Chaos Undivided Word Bearers to summon only Khorne Daemons on the battlefield?  IMHO, I think so.  In the planning stages before a battle, Tzeentch may be more relevant.  During their personal downtime...it's time to worship some Slaanesh!  Then to defile some Imperial temple after a battle, probably taint the place forever with Nurgle.  But during the fight itself, I'd go with the Blood God exclusively, that's His time.

 

I had considered the idea of having 1 of each Chaos power's type, like still have Bloodletters for melee, then maybe Nurglings to sit on an objective, maybe a Lord of Change for fancy psychic stuff, Slaanesh for...more melee, but by that point, I'd basically have a full all-Daemon army.  It'd be a lot of things to keep track.  I dunno.

 

Just experience sharing!

 

 

+++ EDIT - I just thought of Imperial Assassins as a parallel +++

 

 

I was moving some stuff around, including White Dwarfs, and I just saw the issue that included the Imperial Assassins Codex.

 

The different types' points cost in that Codex (which I think was changed in a Chapter Approved to make this moot, but the idea was good) were all the same, meaning you could set aside those points, have 1 of each type of Assassin in your box, and decide on the spot which Assassin to use.

 

That's like the type of tactical flexibility I would like!

 

Unfortunately, whereas the Imperial Assassins bring so much with their specialisations, like I would have a Culexus for anti-psyker than switch out to perhaps an Eversor for general use, I can't think of anything Daemons bring that's as attractive.  I dunno.  I do hope to be proven wrong, though.

 

I think that'd be a cool idea.

Edited June 18, 2020 by N1SB