DG Frustrations

[jgascoine011]

I just want to point out some of my frustrations with the codex. I am hoping that I am missunderstanding some of the rules, so if i am please point it out to me because a lot of whats in the codex just doesnt make a lot of sense.

 

Ok so 1st of is the HQs

Other than the daemon prince, why are all the Lords of the Death Guard all so tragic?

1st the Lord of Virulence. golly gee does is actually supposed to do? It feels like the person who wrote his rules was seperate from the person who wrote the rest of the codex. What core unit has :cussing plague weapons on their shooting? Am i really going to invest in this guy for a 1/6 chance for a Blight Launcher to do an additonal AP? So his plague flamer is crap, his aura is crap, and he is stuck with a fist, which leads us on to the next guy.

 

The lord of contagion, so his man reaper thing is pretty cool, but we have so many anti-horde options that i would always give him the relic one. But again, its his aura. The +3" sounds cool, but then you think. Ok he is slow so you deepstrike him in turn 2, so his aura in now 6", then you use the strat so his aura in now 9"...and you are 9.1"...so golly gee is his point. But I hear you say, there is a psychic power to increase it by 6". Yea but to a maximum of 12" so his aura does nothing anyway. Actually, to be fair, you couldnt use the strat on him because it has to be done in the command phase, so yea, if you use one of your presious psychic slots then yea his aura could be useful every 1 in 2 games....so just take a DP and be more reliable.

 

And finally, the chaos lord. Why is he in the codex? More specifically, why is the chaos lord in terminator armour in the codex? But the time you have given him a fist you may aswell just spend the extra 10 points for the lord of contagion (which has a better CC weapon) or the Virulence guy (who has a heavy flamer).

 

Now i am not saying these are bad HQs, but just, why would you have them over a daemon prince which once again, win out because of mobility. Their auras/buffs are too :cuss to justify taking them.

 

Ok then contagions.

Am i missing something? So if your pure DG you get the -1T contagion, then your warlord can pick the contagion from his plague company, but it only affects him? But then you can spend 2CP at the start of the command phase to give it to some random rhino for a turn?

Again, dont get me wrong, -1T is amazing...but it could have been so much cooler. It could have been you get -1T for being DG then if your whole army is one plague company you get that companys contagion, then you could of had a list of 20 different contagions which you could pick 2 from and made your own plague company, and maybe the lord of contagion could have just picked one which would have only applied to him, or something.

 

Then cultists.

Again, why are they in the codex. Should probably have been nurglings instead to give DG something else other than cheap bodies...which we already have

 

DR

Its very frustrating that once again, a lot of units dont get it.

It means that if you take something like a rhino, your opponent now has a reason to overcharge that plasma...and so dont take rhinos.

It also means things like predators, Land raiders, etc wont be played, at which point, again, why are they in the codex? They are pointless

 

Grenade Strat.

Why is there a grenade strat in the codex? They nerfed it into the ground so why remind us of what once was lol

 

And finally mortarion

Basically if you want to win, take him as he just solves so many of the issues DG have, and it feels like the entire codex was balanced around people taking him

 

 

[Emicus]

Tip: cut out all the pages you don't use. That way you don't get confused all the time.

[McElMcNinja]

There are units that are worthless, I agree. But there are some really good units as well. It’s just a matter of finding what works for you. I’ve had good success with some, others I add because I want them to work. We are definitely in a better place now.

[Bulwyf]

I do have to say that I'm also a little confused as to how the contagions work. I understand mono DG get the -1 T for every unit. But what about the plague company specific contagion? Does every unit get that as well or just the Warlord or characters? 

 

As to the OP: I agree with some of your criticisms. I also have to say that there is a lot to like in this codex. There's more positives than negatives. That doesn't mean the negatives aren't there but overall DG should be in a better position than we have been in a very long time going back to Chaos 3.5 codex. Mortarion is my favorite primarch and possibly my favorite character in all of the lore. He was so bad in 8th I couldn't even use him hardly in any games. Now he is really good and should help carry the army with some of the negatives you have touched upon. 

 

So while I'm not going to ask you to stop voicing your concerns I do think it is worth at least a little looking at the positives we are getting. Balance everything in the codex and we have more going for us than against us. That's a win in my book.

[Azekai]

I don’t get the rampant fanboyism surrounding this codex. It is bad. Bad changes to disgustingly resilient, absurd limits in the hq and troop slots, nonsense changes to wargear that seem to encourage out of the box building without conversions or specialization. War of the spider teased us with powerful and versatile daemon engine lists, we now get... maybe melee drones?

 

Poxwalkers lack saves, can’t take actions, and you can only take a handful of them anyway. But wait! Typhus can buff them- he is capable of giving strength bonus of +1 to his poxwalker buddies! In a small radius! Don’t make me laugh. Daemon heralds do the same thing for better units and no one gives a crap about them.

 

Mortarion is gross. Like, they overshot the mark and I will feel bad unleashing the unkillable quadruple warlord-trait having thing on my friends.

 

Can’t wait for Morty and the terminators to get nerfed so this book won’t have anything dangerous or useful in it.

[Special Officer Doofy]

I'm not a GW fan boy, I refuse to buy directly from them and only buy from 15% off retailers. I like their models and their game, don't care for their predatory business practices or large profit margins for a niche luxury hobby. I will never defend them based on them being GW.

 

Mono DG lists had about a 30% win rate in 8th, which was the second lowest, just above inquisition (which is barely a faction let's be honest). I doubt death guard are worse off than before. I like most of the stuff from the new codex. I was very vocal about how DR got nerfed and argued with mostly non DG players in the news and rumors thread. That did suck. Limiting each Detatchment to one lord also sucks, but makes sense. They did it to tau. Then marines. I was not surprised by it though. The only surprise for me was the stupid new restrictions on wargear loadouts based on the limited options they put in the box. I feel bad for people that need to redo their terminators now.

 

But it's not all doom and gloom. There was alot of internal rebalancing. People weren't taking plague marines and were taking poxwalkers and cultist. So they put a limit on it. People were spamming Daemon Princes, so they put a limit on it. Haulers were great at 100pts and was one of the few units in the game to actually drop in points at the beginning of 9th. But then they all got more accuracy and a second melta shot, so they went up. Mortarion sucked. Bad. Now he's looking like a Daemon primarch. Probably too good. The FW dreads were stupid. I'm glad they got nerfed. The grenade strat and Votlw were too strong compared to anything else the codex could do so they got nerfed.

 

But there was alot of buffs. The wound increase on PM and termies. A legion trait that applies to every unit not just marines and helbrutes. A mono bonus (-1T is awesome). Daemon engines becoming more accurate. Bloat drones losing 1W but losing the bracket. My spewer ones went from 155pts to 130pts. PBC with entropy cannons barely went up but got alot better. Deathshroud are amazing now with two weapon profiles. Some of the swingy d3 damage went to 2D. The never taken Elite characters got better.

 

I'm personally waiting for the codex to be in my hand and play some games before I sell out my death guard. I made a mental note of the changes into pros and cons. The pros outweigh the cons to me. Marines got weaker with the new codex. Can only take one captain. Can't be affected by their own auras, and their vehicles can't be either. Things change.

[Debauchery101]

At first the few reveals made me think DG getting hosed. Now I see the full picture. While I think most of the plague company versions are really not worth taking I can imagine 3 or 4 really good builds.

There are some weaknesses too.

There is an insane amount of easily stacked buffs and debuffs. Which get better as the game goes on..which counters you losing models to a certain extent.

Your opponent will need to really game out how to grind you down and take out certain elements to reduce bonuses and clear debuffs while also trying to play the main mission

One thing I was thinking about as well is the plague furnaces. They are looking like competitive options. 225 for 3. The fact you can deploy them like Infiltrators and make speed bumps and los blockers is nice. Plus they can explode for 3 mortals that don't affect you.

 

My simple overview of the new DG is

Pros-

very good for board control with minimal model needs

You can make your opponent really pay through the nose for making pushes

Troops choices with really nasty hth with combined with debuffs and bonuses even without using strats

Your opponents will need to have a specific plan to use against your list style.

Almost everything can punch above its weight

Cons-

Your plans mostly won't need to be really flexible but you'll need to have a more linear approach and follow those plans. Which includes choosing units that combo with strats

Your characters and psykers being killed will definitely affect you more than other armies

Very few units with hard hitting ranged weapons that can hang back out if range

The new DG seems to be more reliant on your army list vs your in game strategies.

Edited January 20, 2021 by Debauchery101

[Balerion84]

nonsense changes to wargear that seem to encourage out of the box building

And this is bad because...?

 

As a new player, the way it was before was dumb. Either the boxes were supposed to a) contain all the combinations, b ) they should've been selling the bonus weapons separately or(!) c) limit the equipment to match what you actually get.

 

They went with c). It sucks for some people, sure, but it should've been that way from the start.

Edited January 20, 2021 by Balerion84

[Azekai]

 

nonsense changes to wargear that seem to encourage out of the box building

And this is bad because...?

 

As a new player, the way it was before was dumb. Either the boxes were supposed to a) contain all the combinations, b ) they should've been selling the bonus weapons separately or(!) c) limit the equipment to match what you actually get.

They went with c). It sucks for some people, sure, but it should've been that way from the start.

 

As an older player, this is never how it was. Why do you assume how they sell it to you is how it should be? As if building the little toys out of a box given to you by a company is somehow better and superior. 'Be happy you get to mindlessly consume these new kits and build them as you are told.'

 

Why not have the freedom to make a bunch of knife-wielding plague marines? Or triple plasma? Because GW didn't deign to make them for you? This all feels so corporatist and gross.

Edited January 20, 2021 by Azekai

[Balerion84]

 

 

 

nonsense changes to wargear that seem to encourage out of the box building

And this is bad because...?

 

As a new player, the way it was before was dumb. Either the boxes were supposed to a) contain all the combinations, b ) they should've been selling the bonus weapons separately or(!) c) limit the equipment to match what you actually get.

They went with c). It sucks for some people, sure, but it should've been that way from the start.

As an older player, this is never how it was. Why do you assume how they sell it to you is how it should be? As if building the little toys out of a box given to you by a company is somehow better and superior. 'Be happy you get to mindlessly consume these new kits and build them as you are told.'

 

Why not have the freedom to make a bunch of knife-wielding plague marines? Or triple plasma? Because GW didn't deign to make them for you? This all feels so corporatist and gross.

Because if I buy a box of toy soldiers, I should be getting all that I can use. Either that, or the bonus weapons should be sold officially. Buying more boxes to get the bits that you actually need or hunting them down who-knows-where is dumb. And to be honest, feels a lot like a Stockholm syndrome to me when I see people defending this practice.

 

Is this the perfect solution? No. Is it good for my budget? Yes and I don't feel being pushed into buy more toys that I don't actually need. To make a 5 man squad with 2 blight launchers, I'd have to buy 2 boxes of 7 Plague marines. That is nuts.

If you want to customize or kitbash your stuff, you can do whatever you want still, you'll just have to maybe find a different way to customization than weapons.

 

If you don't like it, push GW to sell weapons separately so they are actually available so I don't have to pretend that this huge spewer is actually a blight launcher.

 

If GW isn't going to sell equipment separately, then they need to make sure, that you get all you can use in their boxes.

 

So yes, I'm happy with the change and I hope all armies are changed in this way IF they are not going to sell the bits in their own

[Lord Raven 19]

I agree with most of the changes but the wargear limits and the Lord rule (good in theory, we need another couple HQs before it works really).

[Special Officer Doofy]

The wargear change sucks, but Balerion84 is 100% right. It's the way it should have been from the start. Have all the options in the box. It was predatory/greedy for GW to not put everything in there, not make simple weapon sprues sold separately, and then enforce a rule that to play at their stores they need to be 90%+ GW models (to limit 3rd party). Forces you to buy a whole other box for a couple bits or from a overpriced box splitter. It sucks that it changed out of nowhere on us, but it sucks even more on GW for being as shady as they are from the get go.

[jgascoine011]

I do have to say that I'm also a little confused as to how the contagions work. I understand mono DG get the -1 T for every unit. But what about the plague company specific contagion? Does every unit get that as well or just the Warlord or characters? 

 

As to the OP: I agree with some of your criticisms. I also have to say that there is a lot to like in this codex. There's more positives than negatives. That doesn't mean the negatives aren't there but overall DG should be in a better position than we have been in a very long time going back to Chaos 3.5 codex. Mortarion is my favorite primarch and possibly my favorite character in all of the lore. He was so bad in 8th I couldn't even use him hardly in any games. Now he is really good and should help carry the army with some of the negatives you have touched upon. 

 

So while I'm not going to ask you to stop voicing your concerns I do think it is worth at least a little looking at the positives we are getting. Balance everything in the codex and we have more going for us than against us. That's a win in my book.

 

Oh yea there are some good things.

Like i said, -1T is actually huge, wounding marines on 3's, while they wound us on 5's is massive, although i think SM do have generally better units & strats that DG which i dont mind so much.

And daemon engines getting BS3+ is again, huge, but again, why is anyone going to take a defiler as its now a perfect target for over charged plasma...however also not getting core is just incredibly dumb. A redemptor dread can get core but a blight hauler cant, come on GW.

And the foul blightspawn is pretty much an auto take, especially with his relic.

 

There are just too many dead units though, and it feels like they were just trying to fluff out the book. As i said, nobody is going to take Lord of Contagion/Virulence/Chaos lord as their aura is just too pathetic to justify over the mobility and utility of a daemon prince. 

Everything having DR should have been a rule. Its not like land raiders and drednoughts were being played competitvly before. Hell this may have even given a land raider a reason to be taken. A even with the -1D, nobody was taking standard dreadnoughts in SM lists, so -2D to normal dreads may have seen them played in DG.

And the bigilous, again, not ever going to be taken. The grenade strat does not do enough to justify him.

 

I think GW :cussed up on how DG are supposed to be played. We should have been a very resiliant, short range, shooting army with some decent combat. Now we are a resiliant army with combat. Too many of our units have bolter weapons, and well, they suck. S4 AP- D1 shots do not cut it, especially on such an elite army. And then investment into them to get them to work requires the stars to aligen...it is just not worth it. 

 

And the secondary objectives...just golly gee. I actually watch TTT review on this and they actually pissed me off a bit for a channel whos opionions i normally respect. You get 3VP if an enemy unit fails moral...ok so if i play a game every day for a month, i might, might, just get a total of 15VP over the entire month. And the other one where you basically are forced to take MW to do an action....why would I ever do that. Oh but you can do it on poxwalkers....which are now limited by the numbers you can take, and yea good luck getting pox walkers on 5 objectives. And finally the last one where if you are winning then you win, but if you are loosing then you lose. Infact a lot of the secondary objectives hurt DG. For one we will never be able to take abhore the witch if running a battalion. WWSWF means that plague marines are probably going to be forced to be chosen. The army is still quite slow so EOAF is rather hard. None of the action ones will be taken as you cant justify PM standing doing nothing.

 

And finally our strats are all just a bit pants. There are some decent ones such as +1A on plague knives, fury of the 1st, and some of the plague company ones are ok, but the rest are just pants or just got :cuss on with the nerf bat.

The +1D on the PBC is ok, but you cant be guaranteed that as soon as you use it you will roll a 1 for number of shots or something.

 

Again, not saying its a :cuss codex, but there are some really stupid decisions by GW on some of the units. 

Its almost like the opposite of necrons which had good units but a :cuss codex. This has a good codex, but with :cuss units

[Umbros]

 

I do have to say that I'm also a little confused as to how the contagions work. I understand mono DG get the -1 T for every unit. But what about the plague company specific contagion? Does every unit get that as well or just the Warlord or characters? 

 

As to the OP: I agree with some of your criticisms. I also have to say that there is a lot to like in this codex. There's more positives than negatives. That doesn't mean the negatives aren't there but overall DG should be in a better position than we have been in a very long time going back to Chaos 3.5 codex. Mortarion is my favorite primarch and possibly my favorite character in all of the lore. He was so bad in 8th I couldn't even use him hardly in any games. Now he is really good and should help carry the army with some of the negatives you have touched upon. 

 

So while I'm not going to ask you to stop voicing your concerns I do think it is worth at least a little looking at the positives we are getting. Balance everything in the codex and we have more going for us than against us. That's a win in my book.

 

Oh yea there are some good things.

Like i said, -1T is actually huge, wounding marines on 3's, while they wound us on 5's is massive, although i think SM do have generally better units & strats that DG which i dont mind so much.

And daemon engines getting BS3+ is again, huge, but again, why is anyone going to take a defiler as its now a perfect target for over charged plasma...however also not getting core is just incredibly dumb. A redemptor dread can get core but a blight hauler cant, come on GW.

And the foul blightspawn is pretty much an auto take, especially with his relic.

 

There are just too many dead units though, and it feels like they were just trying to fluff out the book. As i said, nobody is going to take Lord of Contagion/Virulence/Chaos lord as their aura is just too pathetic to justify over the mobility and utility of a daemon prince. 

Everything having DR should have been a rule. Its not like land raiders and drednoughts were being played competitvly before. Hell this may have even given a land raider a reason to be taken. A even with the -1D, nobody was taking standard dreadnoughts in SM lists, so -2D to normal dreads may have seen them played in DG.

And the bigilous, again, not ever going to be taken. The grenade strat does not do enough to justify him.

 

I think GW up on how DG are supposed to be played. We should have been a very resiliant, short range, shooting army with some decent combat. Now we are a resiliant army with combat. Too many of our units have bolter weapons, and well, they suck. S4 AP- D1 shots do not cut it, especially on such an elite army. And then investment into them to get them to work requires the stars to aligen...it is just not worth it. 

 

And the secondary objectives...just golly gee. I actually watch TTT review on this and they actually pissed me off a bit for a channel whos opionions i normally respect. You get 3VP if an enemy unit fails moral...ok so if i play a game every day for a month, i might, might, just get a total of 15VP over the entire month. And the other one where you basically are forced to take MW to do an action....why would I ever do that. Oh but you can do it on poxwalkers....which are now limited by the numbers you can take, and yea good luck getting pox walkers on 5 objectives. And finally the last one where if you are winning then you win, but if you are loosing then you lose. Infact a lot of the secondary objectives hurt DG. For one we will never be able to take abhore the witch if running a battalion. WWSWF means that plague marines are probably going to be forced to be chosen. The army is still quite slow so EOAF is rather hard. None of the action ones will be taken as you cant justify PM standing doing nothing.

 

And finally our strats are all just a bit pants. There are some decent ones such as +1A on plague knives, fury of the 1st, and some of the plague company ones are ok, but the rest are just pants or just got on with the nerf bat.

The +1D on the PBC is ok, but you cant be guaranteed that as soon as you use it you will roll a 1 for number of shots or something.

 

Again, not saying its a codex, but there are some really stupid decisions by GW on some of the units. 

Its almost like the opposite of necrons which had good units but a codex. This has a good codex, but with units

 

 

DG are trench fighters. Close round fighting makes complete sense. This is their fluff. 

 

DG have maybe the best stratagem list I've seen in the game. It is page after page of gold. I have no idea how you could conclude otherwise. Genuinely baffling.

[jgascoine011]

 

 

I do have to say that I'm also a little confused as to how the contagions work. I understand mono DG get the -1 T for every unit. But what about the plague company specific contagion? Does every unit get that as well or just the Warlord or characters? 

 

As to the OP: I agree with some of your criticisms. I also have to say that there is a lot to like in this codex. There's more positives than negatives. That doesn't mean the negatives aren't there but overall DG should be in a better position than we have been in a very long time going back to Chaos 3.5 codex. Mortarion is my favorite primarch and possibly my favorite character in all of the lore. He was so bad in 8th I couldn't even use him hardly in any games. Now he is really good and should help carry the army with some of the negatives you have touched upon. 

 

So while I'm not going to ask you to stop voicing your concerns I do think it is worth at least a little looking at the positives we are getting. Balance everything in the codex and we have more going for us than against us. That's a win in my book.

 

Oh yea there are some good things.

Like i said, -1T is actually huge, wounding marines on 3's, while they wound us on 5's is massive, although i think SM do have generally better units & strats that DG which i dont mind so much.

And daemon engines getting BS3+ is again, huge, but again, why is anyone going to take a defiler as its now a perfect target for over charged plasma...however also not getting core is just incredibly dumb. A redemptor dread can get core but a blight hauler cant, come on GW.

And the foul blightspawn is pretty much an auto take, especially with his relic.

 

There are just too many dead units though, and it feels like they were just trying to fluff out the book. As i said, nobody is going to take Lord of Contagion/Virulence/Chaos lord as their aura is just too pathetic to justify over the mobility and utility of a daemon prince. 

Everything having DR should have been a rule. Its not like land raiders and drednoughts were being played competitvly before. Hell this may have even given a land raider a reason to be taken. A even with the -1D, nobody was taking standard dreadnoughts in SM lists, so -2D to normal dreads may have seen them played in DG.

And the bigilous, again, not ever going to be taken. The grenade strat does not do enough to justify him.

 

I think GW up on how DG are supposed to be played. We should have been a very resiliant, short range, shooting army with some decent combat. Now we are a resiliant army with combat. Too many of our units have bolter weapons, and well, they suck. S4 AP- D1 shots do not cut it, especially on such an elite army. And then investment into them to get them to work requires the stars to aligen...it is just not worth it. 

 

And the secondary objectives...just golly gee. I actually watch TTT review on this and they actually pissed me off a bit for a channel whos opionions i normally respect. You get 3VP if an enemy unit fails moral...ok so if i play a game every day for a month, i might, might, just get a total of 15VP over the entire month. And the other one where you basically are forced to take MW to do an action....why would I ever do that. Oh but you can do it on poxwalkers....which are now limited by the numbers you can take, and yea good luck getting pox walkers on 5 objectives. And finally the last one where if you are winning then you win, but if you are loosing then you lose. Infact a lot of the secondary objectives hurt DG. For one we will never be able to take abhore the witch if running a battalion. WWSWF means that plague marines are probably going to be forced to be chosen. The army is still quite slow so EOAF is rather hard. None of the action ones will be taken as you cant justify PM standing doing nothing.

 

And finally our strats are all just a bit pants. There are some decent ones such as +1A on plague knives, fury of the 1st, and some of the plague company ones are ok, but the rest are just pants or just got on with the nerf bat.

The +1D on the PBC is ok, but you cant be guaranteed that as soon as you use it you will roll a 1 for number of shots or something.

 

Again, not saying its a codex, but there are some really stupid decisions by GW on some of the units. 

Its almost like the opposite of necrons which had good units but a codex. This has a good codex, but with units

 

 

DG are trench fighters. Close round fighting makes complete sense. This is their fluff. 

 

DG have maybe the best stratagem list I've seen in the game. It is page after page of gold. I have no idea how you could conclude otherwise. Genuinely baffling.

 

Eh really?

4 CP for cloud of flies compared to the old 1 is good? 2CP for VotLW compared to the old 1 is good? Strats only going off when a character is killed is good? Blight bombardment is good?????? Rlease the toxins? 2CP to do 1 MW to units within 7"!!! :cussing tragic

Which strats (others than the one i mentioned) are good?

There are also very few pre-game strats other than the basic extra WLT/relic. Infact i think the only one is giving DR to spawn (oh how amazing)

 

I agree with the trench fighters, but the rules do not transfer across. Thats why DG should have been a short range army, throwing grenades, firing bolters at close raneg and being decent at combat. Right now they are only decent at combat.

[templarphoenix]

How do you take your plague marines to objectives without rhino...?

[Iron Sage]

Yeah, I mean, looking at our stratagems now compared to those in 8th, most of the new ones are better, while the overpowered ones are naturally nerfed. I mean, small strats such as Vermid Whispers give your blightlord squads + to hit for just a single command point. It's usually expensive to boost a Terminator unit without characters, but just 1 point. That's really good. The nerfed Blight Bombardment, the new one, the Blightening, well that is 18 hits and if you have a Biologus nearby, that is 18 STR 4, Dam 2, AP 1 plague hits, and if you spend a CP extra this is 12 " range when combined with the 1 CP strat overwhelming generosity (which is a really good strat with high utility). How is that not good ? The nerf to Blight Bombardment was prudent, come on, it was not balanced. This version is really, really strong as well, a powerful combo for 2 CPs (in case you lack range, 1 CP if not). You may well find yourself in range of contaigions as well, and then the grenades wound marines on 3+ with re-roll 1s, which can easily lead to heaps of dam 2 AP-1 wounds.

 

And Cloud of Flies is still worth it at 2 CP, but prohibitably expensive for Terminators. But it is not broken now. The Dead Walk again is fine for 1 Cp. Good chance at getting 4-5 models back. Grandfather's Influence is incredibly strong for 1 CP, put it on 3 spawns and you have a very cheap unit that takes effort in taking down. It will be much tougher than it should be for the points. Befouled Incubator is good for a single CP if you kill 3-4 models, but situational yet a nice tool for extra MWs. Fire Fever isn't bad if you have a helbrute. Diseased Effluent can be truly good. In many games you can be a bit stuck and the opportunity to take a wound and give the enemy unit tarpiting you 2D3 Mortal Wounds on a 2+ can be potentially game changing. Situational, but still it is a very interesting strat. And Haze of Corruption is fantastic and very much worth 2 CPs. To give the old flail rule on an entire unit is potentially devastating. Befouled Incubators, again for those moments where you just have to do 1-2 extra damage, it can be worth it one cp for sure for the 3+ chance to give Mortal Wound per model slain. If you got 1-2 Myphitic Blight Haulers, then Belching Fumes is really, really strong for a single CP and can mitigate a lot of incoming fire from certain units.

 

Daemonic Gluttony costs only single CP and can give crucial wounds back to damaged defilers and Tresher-drones in particular.

Flash Outbreak for 2 Cp can give your unit a contagion that can mess up enemy units, obviously a good strat and lasts an entire turn.

 

I have been sitting here now, comparing the old dex strats to the new. And the only thing I miss from the old codex are strats to heal characters and contaminated monstrosity on vehicles. Nothing much else.I guess Life Eater from War of the Spider was really good for 1 CP, but causing extra wounds in CC isn't an issue for Death Guard I think.

Unless I am missing something really glaring, the new stratagems are considerably better with the exception of the totally fine nerfs to Blight Bombardment (not that the new The Blightening is weak with a biologus, 18 Str 4 plague -1AP, 2 DAM is pretty damn good) and the probably unbalanced old version of Cloud of Flies.

Edited January 20, 2021 by Iron Sage

[jgascoine011]

How do you take your plague marines to objectives without rhino...?

 

Spend the extra points on more PM and walk them across. For the same points as a rhino i can pretty much get 4PM, which are hilariously more survivable against everything but D1 weapons. It also doesnt kill you guys when it dies

[templarphoenix]

 

 

How do you take your plague marines to objectives without rhino...?

Spend the extra points on more PM and walk them across. For the same points as a rhino i can pretty much get 4PM, which are hilariously more survivable against everything but D1 weapons. It also doesnt kill you guys when it dies

At the time you walking these fatties to the objective(s), your opponent might just sit there and prepared to counter attack. DGs are tough, but you sure you have enough firepower to clean a prepared location out for these guys?

[L30n1d4s]

I agree with those who think the new DG strats are very competitive. Combined with the rest of the book (WL Traits, Relics, Psychic Powers, Special Rules, etc.) and you have quite a strong Codex.

 

For example, if you move 10 Blightlords with Combi Bolters up alongside Mortarion and the Tallyman with the Relic to get extra hits on inmodified 6s to hit and then use the new rules to boost Morty's Contagion Aura out to 12", plus use the Strats to make the Blightlords +1 to hit, +1 to wound, and have Plague Weapons on their Combi-Bolters, then you have 40 shots shooting at BS2+, rerolls 1s to hit (from Mortarion) and exploding hits on 6s, resulting in an average of 45-46 hits.

 

 

Against a 20 man Necron Warrior Phalanx, who are now T3 due to Contagion aura, those 45-46 bolter hits are wounding on 2+s, with full rerolls to wound (i.e. like old school Guilliman rerolls in 8th edition), giving you 44-45 wounds, 21-22 failed saves, and all 20 Necron Warriors dead (with no chance for Reanimation).

 

And that is just from Combi-Bolter fire, not counting melee from the Blightlords or any of the damage that Mortarion can do (to put it into perspective, that is similar to what fully powered up Grey Knight Paladins can do with their Psybolt Stormbolters, when you have all the right Tides, Strats, Psychic powers, and Chaplain Litanies on them).

 

If that is not a good example of the powerful rules/synergies in this book, then I am not sure what is!

Edited January 20, 2021 by L30n1d4s

[Iron Sage]

 

 

How do you take your plague marines to objectives without rhino...?

Spend the extra points on more PM and walk them across. For the same points as a rhino i can pretty much get 4PM, which are hilariously more survivable against everything but D1 weapons. It also doesnt kill you guys when it dies

At the time you walking these fatties to the objective(s), your opponent might just sit there and prepared to counter attack. DGs are tough, but you sure you have enough firepower to clean a prepared location out for these guys?

 

I don't think you should view this in a vacuum. Those plague marines will not be the spearhead usually, unless they are geared for melee. And the ones who will clear that objective and just continue going is probably going to be your 10 Blightlords. 5" movement with a turn 1 advance is probably enough in 9ed with the smaller table almost everyone plays on. If very worried, pay the tax for a Noxious Blightbringer to add 1 to move and advance. The smaller table in 9ed and the mid table objectives really help us out a lot.

[templarphoenix]

Well I have 40 plague marines (gift exchange sucks...), so ofcouse I will sholve some of them with spewer and melee weps into objective(s) at turn 1.

[Kallas]

Eh really?

4 CP for cloud of flies compared to the old 1 is good? 2CP for VotLW compared to the old 1 is good? Strats only going off when a character is killed is good? Blight bombardment is good?????? Rlease the toxins? 2CP to do 1 MW to units within 7"!!! :cussing tragic

 

Here's where you are not seeing this book as a 9th Ed book.

 

Those strats were amazing in 8th Ed...because they're were way undercosted. 1CP VotLW? Insanely effective, and you'd use it every single phase you could, because it's Just. That. Good. 2CP? Still very good, but a lot more reasonably costed.

 

4CP Cloud of Flies? Yep, that's expensive...to make an extremely good, tough unit even tougher. And it's only 4CP on Terminators, not on any unit; a unit of PM can have it for 2CP...oops, you can't shoot me off this objective now. 2CP still well spent. 1CP for the 8th Ed version was, again, a no brainer - of course you'll use it. Oh, but now in 9th Ed you aren't forced to use it in your Movement phase, it's used in your opponent's shooting phase (I believe, correct me if I'm wrong there). It's still an incredibly strong ability.

 

The grenade strat? Yup, it no longer pumps out a million mortal wounds...because it was a horrible strategy. It either absolutely annihilated a target unit (or units) or failed and you were out a bunch of CP and probably a couple of units. New grenade strat is useful, but no longer a no brainer strat.

 

These things aren't in isolation either. Take a look at the Necron and SM 9th Ed books. Pretty much everything in those books is the same: it's all good in the right circumstances, but not universally amazing. 9th Edition is toning down super powerful combos; it's just that not all factions have their books yet (eg, CSM and their Endless Cacophony/VotLW combo still existing: but I'd bet money that it won't exist in it's current form in their 9th Ed book).

 

 

Edit: Worth noting, I do agree that the Lord of the Death Guard/Infernal Jealousy restrictions are a bit too tight. Limited HQ options makes it unwieldy compared to Necrons/SM who have similar restrictions but far greater options to fill out the slots.

Edited January 20, 2021 by Kallas

[Iron Sage]

 

Eh really?

4 CP for cloud of flies compared to the old 1 is good? 2CP for VotLW compared to the old 1 is good? Strats only going off when a character is killed is good? Blight bombardment is good?????? Rlease the toxins? 2CP to do 1 MW to units within 7"!!! :cussing tragic

 

Here's where you are not seeing this book as a 9th Ed book.

 

Those strats were amazing in 8th Ed...because they're were way undercosted. 1CP VotLW? Insanely effective, and you'd use it every single phase you could, because it's Just. That. Good. 2CP? Still very good, but a lot more reasonably costed.

 

4CP Cloud of Flies? Yep, that's expensive...to make an extremely good, tough unit even tougher. And it's only 4CP on Terminators, not on any unit; a unit of PM can have it for 2CP...oops, you can't shoot me off this objective now. 2CP still well spent. 1CP for the 8th Ed version was, again, a no brainer - of course you'll use it. Oh, but now in 9th Ed you aren't forced to use it in your Movement phase, it's used in your opponent's shooting phase (I believe, correct me if I'm wrong there). It's still an incredibly strong ability.

 

The grenade strat? Yup, it no longer pumps out a million mortal wounds...because it was a horrible strategy. It either absolutely annihilated a target unit (or units) or failed and you were out a bunch of CP and probably a couple of units. New grenade strat is useful, but no longer a no brainer strat.

 

These things aren't in isolation either. Take a look at the Necron and SM 9th Ed books. Pretty much everything in those books is the same: it's all good in the right circumstances, but not universally amazing. 9th Edition is toning down super powerful combos; it's just that not all factions have their books yet (eg, CSM and their Endless Cacophony/VotLW combo still existing: but I'd bet money that it won't exist in it's current form in their 9th Ed book).

 

 

Edit: Worth noting, I do agree that the Lord of the Death Guard/Infernal Jealousy restrictions are a bit too tight. Limited HQ options makes it unwieldy compared to Necrons/SM who have similar restrictions but far greater options to fill out the slots.

 

Exactly and agree with every word (and yes, you are correct on Cloud of Flies in your post above). What Jgascoine doesn't seem to understand is that Veterans of the Long War/Eternal Hatrd and obviously overpowered strats like that, will be nerfed to 2 CPs when Chaos Space marines comes out. There are obvious systemic changes in the 9ed codices after all and you should look at them (Codex Space Marines, Codex Necrons and Codex Death Guard) in that context. A direct comparison with the best no-brainer stuff from 8ed is not very helpful

 

What this codex has done though, is to make more of our units playable compared to before. 7 " moving Possessed is now worth the points and will be seen in some lists (far from all, but that's the point, we have options now), while super strong terminators is the only real no-brainer to field. What else is field-able now in some lists ? Well chaos spawn for one. Take 3, spend a CP, and voila you have a unit that is ridiculously strong for the points. Plague Marines are good or average depending on how you equip them. Death Shroud suddenly awesome. Poxwalkers better than before when down to 5 points with T4 and 6+ shrug. Defiler can be used without totally gimping your list, hurrah for that. And drones are good, blight haulers still okay. Helbrutes are better and maybe good in some lists, but at least they no longer suck.

 

The only really terrible unit is cultists and maybe the land raider, even the noxious blightbringer can bring crucially needed movement to a foot slogging list. This is a significant improvement.

 

But yeah, what really sucks is Infernal Jealousy. I get that it is fluffy, but when we have no other option than a termie sorcerer and a plaguecaster, it is probably too restrictive. That and the FNP nerf, but I am over that some time ago anyway.

[McElMcNinja]

After doing some list constructions, I seem to always be spending 4-5 CP pre game. On top of that it’s a very CP hungry army, on the flip side there are some good combos. Not having to blast your opponents of the table helps, but come later rounds it’s going to hurt. We are really going to have to weigh everything before we act.

I can deal with the load out issues in my squads, cuz frankly I never invested too much in shooting. I do have to cut some arms off and remodel, not a huge deal for me as it’s part of the hobby I enjoy. I had 20 possessed, probably won’t use more then 10 now so they will be sold. I’ve had spawn collecting dust for a long time, I’m glad I get to field them now. Like most armies when a new codex comes out, things change. I’ve had a sorcerer in terminator armor sitting in the box forever, now I have a reason to put him together. I am glad I only ever painted 10 cultists, they seem like a waste of space in the codex. I almost bought a Landraider, glad I waited. I do have empathy for those who lost more then I did.

But, barring some horrible FAQ, I like what I have and see us in a better spot. SMs beware, along with others as they have 2 or 3 armies they have to prepare for. Several of my games I’ve been told if I was a SM army they would have done better.

Final thought, if you’re dealt limes make margaritas.