Wh40k 10th Edition Faction Focus: Death Guard

[Vardus]

https://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Death-Guard-Plague-Marines-2020

 

It's the Icon/Sigil carried by the Plague Marine on the bottom right.

Edited June 4, 2023 by Vardus
The text about the unit also call it out as an Icon

[DemonGSides]

7 minutes ago, WrathOfTheLion said:

There's also one in the kit, it's held in one hand forward.

I've got a box unbuilt, I see it, I've also got that one built.  That's the sloppiness part of what I'm saying.

 

I've also got the single release, as I posted above, built right in front of me.  That's the thing I'm hoping has its own datasheet. I think I may have been unclear on what I was saying.

 

 

Edited June 4, 2023 by DemonGSides

[Scribe]

14 hours ago, SkimaskMohawk said:

 

Yea, like grenades being a mortal wound strat now. Remember when you had to buy frag grenades, and that let you strike at initiative when charging through difficult?

 

An actual logical rule. 

[Dark Legionnare]

6 hours ago, Scribe said:

An actual logical rule. 

Are you saying the potential that a guardsman tossing a frag (ostensibly a future pineapple grenade) having the chance to kill two terminators or three marines  (Unless they have a way to mitigate mortal wounds) with small shrapnel, when the latter is wearing power armor that stops .75 caliber rpg's from traitor marines and the former is a walking tank, is a silly thing?

 

</Sarcasm>

 

Even when used as a thrown weapon in old style it made more sense since a frag was only S3...

[sitnam]

11 minutes ago, Dark Legionnare said:

Are you saying the potential that a guardsman tossing a frag (ostensibly a future pineapple grenade) having the chance to kill two terminators or three marines  (Unless they have a way to mitigate mortal wounds) with small shrapnel, when the latter is wearing power armor that stops .75 caliber rpg's from traitor marines and the former is a walking tank, is a silly thing?

 

</Sarcasm>

 

Even when used as a thrown weapon in old style it made more sense since a frag was only S3...

That seems a bit unfair, as the grenade start even could easily portray Krak grenades as well

 

I think 8th and 9th had it right with grenades being a profile, but I prefer the new rule to the old pre-8th rules

Edited June 4, 2023 by sitnam

[Dark Legionnare]

1 hour ago, sitnam said:

That seems a bit unfair, as the grenade start even could easily portray Krak grenades as well

 

I think 8th and 9th had it right with grenades being a profile, but I prefer the new rule to the old pre-8th rules

A fair point and proposal!

 

I think it's more that in the transition from oldhammer (3rd-7th) to 8th+ the Frag and Krak grenades (and their equivalents across other factions) just lost their way/relevancy.

 

They had a purpose in oldhammer:

-Reasonable roles in affecting infantry fighting through congested areas where explosions would be especially dangerous (IE: terrain)

 

-Light anti-tank weapons for your basic infantry who aren't lugging around man-portable AT. Helps portray that all but the toughest buttoned down tanks (Land raider equivalents) is vulnerable to enemies swarming it and stuffing explosives in vents, track wheels, etc...

 

Now that initiative is gone, the former matters not & now that basic human troops can chip away at a Land Raider (which was functionally immune to all but purposeful anti-armor firepower) with swarms of lasfire (or autoguns), there's no need for the latter.

 

I think the best portrayal post oldhammer was when certain armies had the ability to just throw all their grenades in a squad. Imperial Fists, Krieg, etc... via strategem. Wasn't powerful, but could do some okay work like a hail (a whole squad chucking grenades simultaneously) of grenades would. Which this new strategem absolutely could be fluff'd as implying.

 

But still. I think they just suffer a case of "Don't really have a place in current 40K"

Edited June 5, 2023 by Dark Legionnare

[Cryptix]

4 hours ago, Dark Legionnare said:

A fair point and proposal!

 

I think it's more that in the transition from oldhammer (3rd-7th) to 8th+ the Frag and Krak grenades (and their equivalents across other factions) just lost their way/relevancy.

 

They had a purpose in oldhammer:

-Reasonable roles in affecting infantry fighting through congested areas where explosions would be especially dangerous (IE: terrain)

 

-Light anti-tank weapons for your basic infantry who aren't lugging around man-portable AT. Helps portray that all but the toughest buttoned down tanks (Land raider equivalents) is vulnerable to enemies swarming it and stuffing explosives in vents, track wheels, etc...

 

Now that initiative is gone, the former matters not & now that basic human troops can chip away at a Land Raider (which was functionally immune to all but purposeful anti-armor firepower) with swarms of lasfire (or autoguns), there's no need for the latter.

 

I think the best portrayal post oldhammer was when certain armies had the ability to just throw all their grenades in a squad. Imperial Fists, Krieg, etc... via strategem. Wasn't powerful, but could do some okay work like a hail (a whole squad chucking grenades simultaneously) of grenades would. Which this new strategem absolutely could be fluff'd as implying.

 

But still. I think they just suffer a case of "Don't really have a place in current 40K"

I'm going to be honest, as a Tyranid player in 7th the Charging through cover rules really meant "have fun paying for flesh hooks in order to get a rule the most common armies in the game get for free" 

[Dark Legionnare]

9 hours ago, Cryptix said:

I'm going to be honest, as a Tyranid player in 7th the Charging through cover rules really meant "have fun paying for flesh hooks in order to get a rule the most common armies in the game get for free" 

Gotta' take the ork approach!  "Initiative doesn't matter, they can't possibly kill all of us!" 

Joking of course, I feel that pain.

[Petitioner's City]

14 hours ago, Dark Legionnare said:

 

I think it's more that in the transition from oldhammer (3rd-7th) to 8th+ [...]

 

 

 

I'm going to be very pedantic and suggest using "middlehammer" for that period :)

[KingYertle]

Rob from Goonhammer who played Death Guard in the Exhibition Stream posted some brief thoughts on the game.  He rates the army as middle of the pack.

 

Most interesting comment, "Almost none of the Stratagems are limited to INFANTRY, so you can use a strat to heal Mortarion or make him harder to hit, or buff your PBCs or Defilers"

 

https://www.goonhammer.com/a-weekly-review-of-everything-we-know-about-10th-edition-so-far-june-5th/#The_Kansas_City_Open_Streams

 

 

[Blight1]

Overall from what I have seen from the exhibition game and faction focus deathguard looks to be a killier faction with some tankiness rather than an incredibly tanky faction with a bit of killyness.  It a big shift for them but we'll adjust.  The only sticking point is movement issues.  Feel like it pushes us towards lots of transports which I don't hate but it'll be another major adjustment for a lot of newer DG players.  Heck I had a new guy in 9th that had no idea what a land raider was.  Didn't even know it was in his codex.

[DemonGSides]

I just don't like that the Chaos Rhino isn't Nurgle-y at all.  I probably have enough bits from other units to nurgle-fy a Rhino, but it'd be nice if they would release an upgrade sprue for the Chaos Legions for their vehicles they share with loyalists.

[Dark Legionnare]

1 hour ago, Blight1 said:

Overall from what I have seen from the exhibition game and faction focus deathguard looks to be a killier faction with some tankiness rather than an incredibly tanky faction with a bit of killyness.  It a big shift for them but we'll adjust.  The only sticking point is movement issues.  Feel like it pushes us towards lots of transports which I don't hate but it'll be another major adjustment for a lot of newer DG players.  Heck I had a new guy in 9th that had no idea what a land raider was.  Didn't even know it was in his codex.

With the slight toughness boost, standard since time immemorial, but no FNP or damage reduction I've thought the same. A "necessity" of sorts now, rather than "Probably should have."

I myself never played more than one or two games across all of 8th/9th that didn't have at least two rhinos in it (grossly overpriced as they were; but fun suicide bombs in 8th and psychic awakening) and often enough brought my land-raider too (masochistically; except in PA where you could give it FNP so it became serviceable) so I can definitely tell you it will help with that mobility restriction greatly as I never had much of an issue getting plague marines & characters up in people's faces when they didn't implode turn one.  

The landraider is the big winner of 10th so far.  Through 8th and 9th it was still paying the assault ramp and AV14 points tax (both being HUGE deals in pre-8th) despite those not being a thing in 8th and 9th.  So, getting a perfectly-good lascannon dmg upgrade and toughness bump, while assault ramp is coming back, seems like it will see plenty of love again from folks other than my stubborn ass.

[prava]

7 hours ago, Blight1 said:

Overall from what I have seen from the exhibition game and faction focus deathguard looks to be a killier faction with some tankiness rather than an incredibly tanky faction with a bit of killyness.  It a big shift for them but we'll adjust.  The only sticking point is movement issues.  Feel like it pushes us towards lots of transports which I don't hate but it'll be another major adjustment for a lot of newer DG players.  Heck I had a new guy in 9th that had no idea what a land raider was.  Didn't even know it was in his codex.

 

I can see some Plague Marines with 2x foetid virions on a rhino. A Plaguecaster + blightspawn should have lots of fun with their TORRENT weapons and will allow their content to move forward quickly.

 

The problem I see is that it forces an army to play a certain way. Maybe it is more fun to just run CHAOS SPACE MARINES and use as many nurgle marks as possible and call it a day.

[Plaguecaster]

So it could mean nothing or just be an error on gw’s part but the site has been updated ready for 10th now showing stuff like battle line, epic hero etc However there is a few either errors or changes with death guard 

 

*poxwalkers are not in the battle line section only plague marines which will mean since not battle line pox walkers are only 3 units max 

 

*possessed are not in the death guard section at all hopefully it doesn’t mean they can’t be taken anymore

 

*the icon bearer and plague champion with fist are in the character section so does that mean they are seperate characters now, maybe the icon will actually do something but as a character leading a unit 

Edited June 7, 2023 by Plaguecaster

[DemonGSides]

Where are you seeing all of that?

[Plaguecaster]

31 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

Where are you seeing all of that?

 

On the GW website if you go into armies it now comes up with options in refine to only show stuff like battle line etc

 

 

 

[Grenzer]

On the GW online store. The keyword filters have been updated.

[DemonGSides]

Gotcha that is interesting info.  I don't think it's complete, though, because it also doesn't include Mortarion as having the Fly keyword and he's got big ol wings and the datasheet says he does.

[Nephaston]

Yeah it's not complete. TS are lacking Ahriman as a character selection in the webstore, so some fine tuning will still need to happen.

[Ming the Merciless]

43 minutes ago, Nephaston said:

Yeah it's not complete. TS are lacking Ahriman as a character selection in the webstore, so some fine tuning will still need to happen.

I think named characters come under Epic Hero

[Vardus]

35 minutes ago, Ming the Merciless said:

I think named characters come under Epic Hero

 

They do but some of the other Epic Heroes also have other keywords attached. This leads me to believe that not all keywords have been attached to the searches.

[KingYertle]

Rob from Goonhammer posted a longer synopsis of his exhibition game.  

 

https://www.goonhammer.com/thechirurgeons-road-through-2023-part-9-streaming-10th-edition-at-the-kc-open/

 

Not much more insight into the rules, but reading between the lines, the unit composition all but confirms that weapon upgrades will not be free in 10th.  (the 2x5 man plague marine units only had bolters).

 

Although commenting that he had no real answers for the Greater Daemons, He does note that he doesn't believe Death Guard are the "Dumpster Fire" the internet is making them out to be.  

[Hellex_The_Thanatar]

Ehhh so inner circle on dark angels....what the flip? 

 

Just give nurgul units that to a min of 1! 

[Special Officer Doofy]

9 hours ago, Hellex_The_Thanatar said:

Ehhh so inner circle on dark angels....what the flip? 

 

Just give nurgul units that to a min of 1! 

 

The more I find out, the more I'm glad I'm skipping 10th edition haha.