Winged Daemon Prince of Nurgle

I already had a couple of Daemon Princes.  The first was the Nurgle Daemon Prince  model, this is a nice looking model but it didn’t have wings and didn’t have the double claw weapons which I usually take.  Those things bothered me.  So I then picked up a regular Daemon Prince, this had the wings and the double claws but didn’t look particularly “Nurgle”.  So I’ve been intending for a while to do a kit bash and build a full on winged Daemon Prince of Nurgle.  I mentioned this in my local game store one night and one of the other gamers strolled off, bought a Daemon Prince off the shelf and gave me the wings then and there.  He wanted the Prince for his own project but didn’t need the wings.  So, it was settled, I was going to do this.

Helbrute first, much too large.

Death Guard Tactics – Chaos Lord

How do I use it?

This unit is the cheapest HQ option for the Death Guard, so one use is for it to fill out the HQ slots of a battalion.  However it’s main use is because it offers a re-roll for hit rolls of 1 for Death Guard units within 6″.  So you might, for example, have it hanging back with some Dreadnoughts (the Hellforged Contemptor hits on a 2+, re-rolling 1s is wonderful).  Another really good use is to back up Plague Marines equipped with Plague Marines, it gives a bit of safety for when they’re overcharging their fire.   The Chaos Lord is infantry so can move through ruins and keep up with the whatever infantry he might be accompanying.

Should he be the Warlord?

Death Guard & Nurgle Daemons vs Astra Militarum & Adeptus Mechanicus (1,750 pts) – Battle Report

This was an experimental game where I took an all infantry list against someone who I expected would take a whole lot of armour…

List Theory

Death Guard Battalion

Nurgle Daemons Battalion

After I unexpectedly won my last game with an all infantry list I called into question my belief that such a list will, for Death Guard and Daemons, inevitably get stomped by a list featuring lots of armour.  So I had to test this some more, and the only sensible reaction was to push it to the extreme and stick with all infantry.  So that is what I did.

The Buried Dagger – Book Review

Another quick review, from a Death Guard player’s perspective, of a Black Library 40k novel.  This time The Buried Dagger by James Swallow.  I saw this on the shelves of my local library and it seemed very sensible to pick it up and give it a go.

Death Guard Tactics – Plagueburst Crawler

This is one of my favourite Death Guard units.  It’s a reliable unit that can take an absolute beating and still keep on ticking.

Plaguespitters or Entropy Cannons?

This is a question I see being asked a lot.  When I bought my first one I built it with the cannons, those S8 AP-3 D6 damage shots seemed like a really good idea.  Plus the thing has a great big mortar on its back, it’s got to be long range artillery.  But after playing it several times with the cannons I switched to the Plaguespitters and I’ve never looked back.

Death Guard & Nurgle Daemons vs Astra Militarum (1,000pts) – Battle Report

This was a rematch against the player whose Orks I lost to the week before.  He’s good, and we were still using 1,000 point lists as he wanted to practise for a tournament.

List Theory

I didn’t know what army I was facing, so I couldn’t target my list at any one thing in particular.  1,000 points doesn’t give you a lot of room, the army you build has to be pretty solid and flexible to face all comers.  Compared to last time, I decided to drop the Noctilith Crown.  I think that it has its place but in a small game you won’t have many units to buff and those units need to be off doing things rather than being leashed to the stationary crown.  I also decided to leave out any vehicles or armoured units and to just focus on infantry.  A las cannon equipped Dreadnought can be great, but it’s a bit of a point sink if you don’t come up against any armour.  I’d trust my anti-tank to plasma gun equipped Plague Marines.  Going all infantry should give me some pretty good board control and with the ability to deep strike my Nurgle Daemons I also gain some flexibility.  At 1,000 points we will be playing on a smaller 4ft x 4xt table so the slowness of the Death Guard will hopefully not be too much of an issue.  Finally I added in a Malignant Plague Caster, as I’ve not used one for a long time, and a squad of Cultists for even more table coverage.

The Game

Death Guards vs Orks (1,000 pts) – Battle Report

This was a game against a very good player who was looking to practice a 1,000 point list for a tournament that is going to run at a local game store.  I’ve played him before, losing to his Orks and Genestealer Cult.

List Theory

I knew that this was going to be a tough game that I had to bring my best to in order to stand a chance.  So I built my list around the Noctilith Crown, which might be great for gun line armies, but that’s not how the Death Guard fights.  This really is one of those moments when you have to choose between the list you want to play and the list you feel you have to play to win.  I chose the former, but within those parameters I was going to give it my all.

The Crown gives a 5+ invulnerable save to units nearby and also allows psykers to re-roll attempts to manifest powers.  Given that this was a 1,000 point game I didn’t think I could manage psykers so I went with units that would benefit from the invulnerable save.  This was a unit of Poxwalkers, two units of Plague Marines and a Helbrute. There would be a Chaos Lord to provide re-rolls.  All of those units would be leashed be the Crown as they needed to be close to it.  I therefore needed something mobile and went for a winged Daemon Prince and two Plagueburst Crawlers.  List complete.

The Game