Ever finished?

So is any army ever finished? Well I thought it was but yet again I am proven wrong. My Nurgle Daemon army project was a painting project with the outcome being a 1500 point playable army. Now Daemons were never great and a pure Nurgle army even less great....... then along came 7th edition.

7th puts a new spin on Daemons and causes me a conundrum. In 7th Daemons are actually pretty good, well thats how I see it. With the new Psychic phase and the new Daemonic summoning spells Daemons get a whole lot more viable but it does change my list somewhat.

My list originally was a big Greater Daemon (0 Heralds) and a whole bunch of Troops to try and swamp the enemy, couple of Soul Grinders and some of the new Plaguedrones. Now the new spell list allows me to summon units of Plaguebearers, Flies, Heralds and even a Greater Daemon and it isn't that hard. Now the enabler of this is that you need to make sure you have enough dice to guarantee that you can get the summoning off. You are sacrificing a decent 1500 list for the ability to make sure you can summon and build up a decent army during the game. If the opponent gets a good alpha strike it could cause problems so the first few turns you need to make sure your spell casters are safe.

So what does this mean for me. Well I have to pretty much redesign my list and then paint a bunch of new models. I managed to get a single game in with my Daemons before I had to run off and get married. I took tons of models with me anticipating that I would be summoning loads of things and it didn't turn out that way. Whilst I could summon a lot, I didn't summon as much as I was anticipating. I have a bunch of Bloodletters and Daemonettes lying around that I was going to paint up but I think I will be able to get away with just painting up the rest of my Nurgle stuff. I also found that Nurgle Daemon princes are the monkeys nuts. So having played one game and taking into account the changes 7th has initiated what does this mean for my list and painting schedule?

1. List Redesign. 
I need to change my list around, instead of a horde approach I will have to go with minimum troops to allow me to get in four Heralds all of which will be lvl2 psychics. This should allow me to then start summoning my troops at a fairly rapid rate.

Nurgle Daemon Princes are in - with the ability to Jink and Shrouded built in it means they have a 2+ cover save - I am having two in the list both of which will be lvl2 psychics as well. So these guys can go in the heavy support slot I am going to have to keep the Greater Daemon in, but it means the Soul Grinders have to go. This is a shame as I really like them. At a bigger points limited they would be the first thing back in.

The Beasts of Nurgle are out as I just don't have the points for them in the new layout if the points go up then they will be back in as they are really good. The Plaguedrones are also out as, again, I will be relying on summoning them.

2. Models.

Daemon Prince of Nurgle

So from a model point of view I am going to need to more Plaguebearers that's a given. I will need two Daemon Princes, the first will be the standard issue GW Nurgle DP with the addition of some Balrog wings (from The Lord of the Rings range). The second DP will be a conversation using the Giant from the Warhammer range with the addition of the sword hand from the FW Plaguehulk, the mechanical claw arm from the Soul Grinder and, of course, more Balrog wings.

For the Herald on Palanquin I am going to use the Warhammer Chaos Warshrine and put the plastic Nurgle Herald on the front and add a couple of spare Plaguebearers, one with a banner and one with an instrument just to add a bit of flavour.

Daemon Prince of Nurgle

Herald on a Palanquin

3. Tactics. 

The army is now completely different to pre 7th Ed. Before I was going with a bucket load of troops in the hope of overwhelming the opponent, now the initial list is the complete opposite. Its loaded up with characters meaning that I have much more powerful models on the table but the army is way smaller. If I don't get first turn then I need to survive the Alpha strike otherwise I could go down very quickly. Assuming I do survive the first turn I am then relying on the army to summon at least two maybe even three additional units per turn. I then hope to just summon more than the opponent can deal with. The powerful Daemon Princes and Greater Daemon concentrate on taking out the enemy threats, the summoned hordes can take or camp objectives and the Heralds can just keep summoning more units. The opponent then has to decide to either deal with the Heralds at the risk of being hit by the harder stuff. Take out the Troops faster than I can summon them or try and take out the bigger units but potentially get swamped late game.

So this is the list I am going to go with for a few games to see how it goes. My own thoughts are that its small when its put on the table at the start and as a general rule I am not a fan of small Elite armies. But I am going to try and go against my normal style and play something a little different, i'll let you know how it goes.

Herald on a Palanquin

HQ: Great Unclean One (1#, 260 pts)
   1 Great Unclean One, 260 pts = (base cost 190 + DR: Greater Rewards x1 20 + Psyker (Mastery Level 3) 50)

HQ: Herald of Nurgle (1#, 160 pts)
   1 Herald of Nurgle, 160 pts = (base cost 45 + L: Exalted Locus of Contagion 25 + Psyker (Mastery Level 2) 50 + DS: Palanquin of Nurgle 40)

HQ: Herald of Nurgle (1#, 95 pts)
   1 Herald of Nurgle, 95 pts = (base cost 45 + Psyker (Mastery Level 2) 50)

HQ: Herald of Nurgle (1#, 95 pts)
   1 Herald of Nurgle, 95 pts = (base cost 45 + Psyker (Mastery Level 2) 50)

HQ: Herald of Nurgle (1#, 120 pts)
   1 Herald of Nurgle, 120 pts = (base cost 45 + L: Exalted Locus of Contagion 25 + Psyker (Mastery Level 2) 50)

Troops: Plaguebearers of Nurgle (15#, 135 pts)
   15 Plaguebearers of Nurgle, 135 pts = 15 * 9

Troops: Plaguebearers of Nurgle (10#, 90 pts)
   10 Plaguebearers of Nurgle, 90 pts = 10 * 9

Heavy Support: Daemon Prince (1#, 270 pts)
   1 Daemon Prince, 270 pts = (base cost 145 + DG: Daemonic Flight 40 + DG: Warp-forged Armour 20 + Psyker (Mastery Level 2) 50) + DA: Daemon of Nurgle 15

Heavy Support: Daemon Prince (1#, 270 pts)
   1 Daemon Prince, 270 pts = (base cost 145 + DG: Daemonic Flight 40 + DG: Warp-forged Armour 20 + Psyker (Mastery Level 2) 50) + DA: Daemon of Nurgle 15

Daemon Prince of Nurgle

Until next time...