Large units of fiends

Great. So in my 3rd ever post, I advised a guy with over 1500 posts about using a unit in it's most popular way.

.....................awesome. I'll go and sit in the corner now and keep my mouth shut.

No need to feel ashamed, nobody got upset or angry here and post count is just a number. Its what we write thats important, not the number =)

Fiends indeed work really well for warmachine hunting and killing small units. They can also be used as a speedbump against big deathstar hordes, meatshield to greater daemons against cannon balls and running debuff for enemies that you want to catch with some other unit. They are one of the most versatile units on our lists and they have lots of good uses and I would think not all of them has been even discovered yet. So lets keep on studying and finding them out.

In spite of this, I've never felt the inclination to run them solo. Apart from one game I have always used them in units of 3 and I feel that is the optimal size for them in all-comers lists, cheap enough to allow you to fit in some Flamers and not be wasted hunting chaff, but powerful enough to deal with small units of heavy cavalry, chariots, or units of up to 20-ish S3, T3 troops.

Once I've got a few more models, I would like to try out a unit of 6 though, I'm sure it could provide almost as much a threat as a Keeper to many units.

So I tried the brick of 6 fiends this past Saturday. I must say, they pack quite a punch! Turn 2 they charged a unit of 24 savage orcs. I lost the first round of combat for 3 reasons: 1) It ended up a tie and he had a musician so I lost by one. 2) For some f-ing stupid reason I was letting the 2nd rank of SOs attacks w/ 3 attacks instead of just 1 (and I was doing that all night even though I was doing it correctly for my daemonettes. And I had maybe a half a beer in me). 3) I completely forgot the stop attacks (I'm ALWAYS forgetting those!!! ) After the first round of combat I was down to only the front 3 (all unwounded). The next round, though, handily went to the fiends (mostly due to the fact that the SOs were only S3 now) and they defeated and then chased down the SOs and managed to put a lot of pressure on from my opponent's back field.

All in all, I think they did really well considering I was giving my opponent an extra 12 attacks a turn (WTF!?!?!?). Even against a medium sized unit of T4 combat troops and with no support. Against other things ... well, I don't think they'd do well solo against a dedicated combat horde or any medium sized elite combat unit (DE Black Guard, WoC Chosen, elite Dwarf infantry, etc.). I will definitely try them out again.

the trick is to use that sexy M10 to pick a target that you can just lawnmower with a bucketload of S4 AP I6 attacks. i have to say though, i'm continually surprised by the things i can charge them into and watch them come out on top. i'm considering bumping the unit up to 7-8.

I think I would have been fine if I wasn't giving away 12 extra S4 attacks and forgetting the stomps! That's all on me for being a moron. I think things would have been a LOT different then. They actually did really well. I had originally thought about putting them in as 2 units of 3 but I'm glad I did the brick of 6. I won't use them in game 3 (want to test out some other ideas) but the next Death Match challenge I give out, I for sure will use the unit of 6 again to see what they can accomplish vs other armies.

I think they also seem to have a bit of a psychological effect on people. You see a big block of extremely fast MB and your opponent knows he or she is going to HAVE to commit resources to them (magic, shooting, redirectors, etc.) which leaves your other stuff unmolested. Granted in smaller games like I play they take up as many points or more as my infantry combat units but they are definitely a force to be reckoned with! Like I said, I will definitely use them again!

Yeah Legion you were basically playing them Fiends according to the 7th Ed ruleset (no support, no stomp) ... talk about comping yourself.

I've always acknowledged the merits of larger blocks of fiends by 2 out of 3 times I've used them I've managed to pull some really crap moves with them..
Like.. Don't send them into the front of a Horde of 40 Bloodletters.. Stuff like that. It should be noted I was trying to assassinate Characters of course, but it was still a pretty dumn idea.

Unlike you Legion my group is prone to play rather biggish games, at least during summer, so one of these days I'll post a batrep featuring a damn horde of Fiends. For no good reason. I mean.. it's not like it's good or anything.. More like something to have a laugh about.

I'm still undecided on whether I will run 6 or run 4+1+1.

Gah!! I just wish my stuff would arrive so I can get it assembled. I mean, come on postal service!! I have to play with puny mortals of chaos this weekend!!!!! Where are my Daemons!!

breathe out......slowly and calmly

Apologies for the outburst. I'll go back to my corner now..........

hello again all,

so I took 6 fiends last tournament, and I must say I was pleased by the way they performed. Their speed and I makes them awesome indeed if you choose your targets right. And if you have 2 blocks of BL alongside them, it makes it that much easier.6 were indeed enough, 8 would have done the same, but for a 110 pts more.

Next tournament, I'll turn to my 2 times 6 flamers again, but I'm seriously considering the 2 times 1 fiend too. And that all fits into the rare allotment!

Sadly (as was recently brought to my attention) 4+1+1 doesn't work because of the 0-2 cap on rare choices.

Oh yeah. I always forget about that. I'll have to try that in my first 3K game instead.
Thanks for the reminder.

Don't think about it as comping, more like ... "challenging" myself. Or, in actual truth, just being reckless and stupid! Think of it more of a test drive: "Let's see what these things can do! Woo-ha!"

We generally play smaller games because we usually end up playing during the week and/or we end up looking up rules a lot since we only play once/month or less. Once this Death Match is up, I'll have to get one of the other guys wrangled into one!

More games is more gooder!

They are actually pretty good at killing monsters to, wounding on 6s Is compensated by sh*tloads of attacks, I have never understood large units of Juggers (besides being cool) the biggest problem with large units of fiends Is ranking up them.