Newbie thoughts and list

Hello all

I'm looking at picking up Daemons, and after a good read through of the book, I have some impressions that I hope a few of the more experience players can comment on.

1) Seems like the lord choices are really overcosted. Princes are really bad and GD's are just so pricey. Do you have issues with "eggs in one basket" syndrome?

2) Heralds of Tzeentch with master of sorcery seem pretty awesome

3) The core all seems to be doing about the same thing. Daemonettes hit hard. Letters hit hard. Bearers are hard to kill. Horrors are hard to kill. Is there much tactical difference between them?

4) Everyone seems to say Seekers are bad, but they seem to me to be just too fast to discount. I mean, they can move 32" the first round. Only pegasus knights can compete with that.

5) the standouts of the book seem to be fleshhounds, fiends, and flamers. Anything else that I have missed?

Here is the 2k list that I am thinking of starting with. Its a fast MSU type Slaanesh list (I hate that you have to mix troops from different gods. Bugs the fluffy side of me):

1 HoS with Siren and torment
1 HoS BsB with Standard of sundering and siren
1 HoT with MoS, wings and lore of beasts

17 Daemonettes
11 Daemonettes w/ stubborn standard
10 Horrors (place to hide HoT if needed)

5 Seekers
5 Seekers
6 Fleshhounds
6 Fleshhounds

1 Fiend
1 Fiend
6 Flamers

Anyway. That's my first jaunt down the road to chaos. Any guidance is appreciated.

Just a quick note about your list, I have played against a few armies with Flamers in them recently and I think that having them in 2 units of 3 instead of 1 unit of 6 is much better. They can do pretty much everything that a unit of 6 can do, just put them next to each other. They then have the option of shooting at the same target or one can finish a unit off and the other can start shooting at a a new unit, saving on wasted attacks. They could also then be set up apart from each other and give your opponent 2 little headaches that they have to deal with.

I'm pretty much in the same boat as you with just starting out with Daemons so I cannot really comment too much on the rest of your post sorry.

If I was going to bunker my HoT in a unit of horrors, I would give him Spellbreaker rather than Winged Horror. That and the Sundering banner provide excellent magic defense. Other than that, your list looks interesting. Very fast troops will bring out questions in some armies. Welcome aboard and good luck.

@ Holtkmoq That seems like an excellent change. 2 units of 3 coming right up!

@ Guilder the horrors are there for an emergency bunker against armies with lots of shooting. I like having the flying mobility since some of the beast spells have such short range. I'm also not a fan of dispel scroll type things in general; its just a personal bias.

1. Yes the Lord Choices are kinda overcosted but that's mainly because our Book is getting kind of old. All the Greater Daemons were fairly well costed for 7th Ed (when the book came out). Even though they all costing the same points base is something that could be debated even back then..
You're right about the Daemon Prince. Probably the worst Lord choice in the game all things concidered.

2. Heralds of Tzeentch with MoS are great. Absolutely.

3. There's a lot more dynamic in the Core section than you've spotted so far. This post would become really long if I was to even brush over this subject. I think again what is sort of fooling you here is the fact they all cost the same points.. which again can be debated but it's the way our book is written. Out of the Core options I'd say Bloodletters are generally concidered a steal for their points, while PBs are concidered just about worth their points, and then there's varying opinions on whether Daemonettes and Horrors actually suck or not.
It's not just a matter of looking at them in a bubble though. For example, Daemonettes have S3 so have a hard time wounding stuff despite hitting a lot, but if you have Daemonettes you can bunker a Herald of Slaanesh and then you can take the Siren Song which suddenly gives you an almost universal edge over your enemy.. So it is not clear cut.

4. Seekers are fast and if you use them wisely not worthless at all. They are however a bit too weak to be a glasshammer, and presents the enemy with a bit too good a return on investment in terms of shooting with only 1 wound and costing as much as they do. Most of the time, there's nothing they can do that others things can't do better (Furies are cheaper, Nurglings are more versatile, not to mention lone Crushers or Fiends).

5. I'd say the "stand-outs" in 8th Ed are:
Bloodletters, Fiends and Flamers.
I'd also say Nurglings deserve an honorary mention.
All the other units in the entire book are either just about 'balanced' toward the averages of the game, or simply overcosted at this point in time.
So don't let anyone tell you Daemons are OP.

FleshHounds are still all right but not the nobrainer of the last edition (at all). The experts on this Forum tells me they are currently about 5 pts too expensive for what they bring to the table.

i skipped 7th ed entirely so i can't speak to that specifically, but as far as GDs go, they constantly blow my mind with how insanely destructive they can be. i had a keeper claim (on her own): 1 ironblaster, 4 mournfangs, 12 ironguts, slaughtermaster, and a firebelly in one game. i've had my great unclean one kill 30 white lions in 2 rounds of combat, and 10 empire knights with grandmaster and 30 flagellants in another game (in CC, not including the body count from his plague magic). they are expensive as hell, but they provide unique solutions to the nastier stuff in the game (chaos knight buses, vampire buses, white lion hordes, etc.).

Hm, yeah, I realize I might have come off as saying GD's are bad..
That's not what I meant to say.
Brother_Maynard is right in what he says.
I'd still not really peg them at 450pts base though. There are 'counters' to them, whereby being a Large Target with 5 wounds that tighs up about a quarter of your army in points can be a big drawback at times.

Still, I use one virtually every game I play. And I should really say at least one.

Hello and welcome to the forums =)

1) Princes are indeed plain horrible. They cost a lot and die easily which is really bad combination. Greater daemons are all good though. Bloodthirster and Keeper of secrets deal around 8 wounds per round against almost everything with stomps included and can take bigger monsters down in one round. Taking down monsters like abomination down fast can be really golden. While Thirster is pretty straightforward point and click destroyer other greaters can offer tons of variety.

Lord of Change might appear expensive at first, but generally you could dubstract heralds cost of him, since he will pretty much replace your need of herald and it all seems better then. You could throw him nasty stuff like death lore, fly to opponents flank and blast away or buff all army with light/beasts lore. GuO can work big amount of roles. lvl4 GuO can kill hordes easily with plaguewind and get tons of Nurglins in return while Balesword GuO is ultimate monster/monstrous creature/character slayer and you can even go points denial with him and nurglin infestation. Keeper on the other hand is known for Ld bombing with Masque and -2Ld banner. He throws Phantasmagoria (as a lvl4) and deals horrible damage with ld based spells and just plain makes everyone run. With spirit swallower he is almost invulnerable regenerating all his wounds in one round of combat and with siren song you can bring good utility. While they all cost much, they definately are great (he heh). Brother_maynard described sheer combat power quite well.

2) Indeed they are. Having 2 of them can be quite cool too.

3) Khorne is again the most straight forward maim and kill approach. Hordes of 30-40 with herald go through almost everything and are pretty much the most popular core daemon choise. Daemonettes on the other hand do not strike so hard and lose in power to letters even with their herald on the unit and against T4 and armoured foes also lose against Plaguebearers. Their maintreat is the siren song, siren banner and stubborn banner though. They move quickly to the position and mess opponents game with siren song instead of actually fighting "properly". There is lots of math hammer to be found of these guys in here, but they can be superb with shadow lore buffs. Plaguebearers are the resilient ones that come close to letters in CR due to their resilience. They deal less kills but endure casualities better. They will also become quite worthy opponents with epidemius and light lore buffs and outshine even letters then. Horrors are perhaps the least used now since heralds and greater daemon mages are much more common. Their most common role now seems to be bunker for a herald. They are not that resilient really, since WS3 and T3 cannot take much casualities even with 4++ save. They bring powerful spells though and with them you can go bit more "gunlineish" approaches. Batter opponent with flamers and bolts of change (with +5 to cast) and weaken him before he gets to you.

4) Unlike Pegasus Knights, these girls cannot take hits at all. Unit of 5 seekers cannot even front charge goblins with spears and win, since they deal only 5,4 kills and goblins deal one wound back, but get 4 static resolution from ranks and flags. Thats pretty poor performance for such an expensive unit. This means that their targets are very limited as they would fail flank charge against majority of real fighting units. Take for example savage orcs with 2 choppas where only 5 of them would be able to strike to the flank. Seekers deal 3 wounds and savage orcs deal 3 wounds back; seekers struggle against static resolution of 4 again and will likely melt away. Not only that, any amount of shooting will easily dispatch all of them. 20 empire crossbowmen for example deals 4,44 wounds per round and level 2 fireball deals 3,11 wounds netting hefty amount of points per kill. Not so tough stuff to be honest...

5) Daemonreign said it all =)

The regulars have covered most of it very well, so I'll just chime in on the quesiotn of lfamers, namely one unit of 6 or 2 units of 3.

I'd recommend hihgly in favour of one unit of 6. This is because a unit of 6 is actually a big threat in melee. Now sure, you can charge in two units of 3 comfortably and achieve the same result, but the big difference is receiving a charge - a unit of 6 can take a charge from most non-horde units, and often win the combat, but even if losing they will live to tell the tale (or long enough to counter-flank the charger). A unit of 3 cannot do this. This means a unit of 6 can actually hold (and often control) a moderate flank, making it much more valuable ni my opinion.

-und_ed

Gotta agree with Ed on this one, Flamers are largely underestimated in CC by most of my opponents. They are great support flankers if you think combats going to be close against anything WS4 and under. Plus if you has 6 they become a decent bunker for a HoT if you don't want Horrors!

6 Flamers + Speed of Light = 9 WS 10, S 5, I 10 Flaming attacks. Just sayin'.

I used 5 and 5 Hounds to tear up a GD of Tzeentch last tournament I was in! Good times!

First, let me say thanks for all the replies. They have been helpful. I just recently spent some tax return money on a few boxes of what I hope will be a pretty decent 2500 point daemon list. My list will be:

Keeper of Secrets w/ Soul Eater

HoS w/ siren, torment blade
HoS w/ BSB, siren, Sundering Banner
HoT w/ MoS and wings

17 Daemonettes w/ command and banner of ecstasy
17 Daemonettes w/ command
11 Horrors
5 Furies
5 Furies

5 Seekers

3 Fiends
3 Fiends
1 Fiend
1 Fiend
6 Flamers

The list is intended to be pretty fast w/ beast magic to buff the daemonettes (and put a great fire dragon on the field every once in a while <3) and a KoS to handle any big nasty elite units. Between the speed of the troops and the furies and the single fiends as redirectors I should be able to pick my battles.

Anyway, just my take on the army. Its a little different than most I think, but I think 2 hordes of bloodletters sounds boring anyway

If your going to go with 'nettes in small numbers maybe beef up the ML's on your Keeper... I have been running my 'Nettes heavy list with the standard Lore; Lvl.3 Kipper and both my Heralds as Lvl.1's to increase my chances of Phantasmagoria throw in the Icon of Despair and you have some solid magic phases.
It also makes your Seekers reliable march blockers and allows for reliable refused flank games as you can double the time it takes for ones opponents to make it into CC!

@bonesaw I may end up going that route. I think for now, I just need to get things assembled and get a few games under my belt to get a handle on how the army plays. I'm impressed by the mathhammer of a unit of daemonettes with just wildform on them. So many attacks...