Hannibal

Actually I´m thinking about some Nurgle Chariots / Varanguard supported by Chosen, Chaos Sorcerer Lord and Glottkin, though this means I have to use it under Nurgle Allegiance because Glootkin are to expensive to be used as allies. Though something similar can be done in StD with Chariots being Khorne marked and the use of some Bloodsecrator and Ruinbringer Warband.

I have to say, I´m going to settle on this Allegiance for the next months because I own a pretty solid collection of mixed daemons. And while I think that the single-god-books offer better allegiance abilities, Simplicity is a Quality on its own.

Sorry, posted second time.

Hi, some questions to you: 1) What about Chariots? They seem to fit all your requirements. And I think they aren´t the worst selection out there. 2) What about Marauders. Though being old sculpts, they definetely look like "old chaos". 3) Marauder Horsemen are newer sculpts and should fit your theme. Why no mention here? That being asked, I have to say that your theme will suffer from being a theme. Themed armies always lack the highest possible rate of synergies due to restricting the model selection. IMO if you like to run a theme, you can always get a workable army but seldom the most competetive one. Therefore: go for it! Chosen buff other Slaves to Darkness units, don´t overlook this. They offer a special kind of synergy you have to use to get the most out of them. IMO they are strong, though slightly overcosted if compared to elite units from different armies. As written by other members here, StD offer some wierd synergies. For example, why does Chaos Lord on Manticore buff warriors but no chosen?

I think I´d drop one unit of Pinks and instead get 6 Flamers + Exalted Flamer. They won´t be as good as under DoT Rules, but they still dish out a lot of damage at range. Other than that there is an endless spell in the StD range which everyone is talking about. Daemonrift ... (???)

Like to elaborate this? Chariots offer mortal wound output and are cheaper, meaning you can much easier fill a battalion. You can either opt for more mortal wound output after a charge (ruinbringer) or mortal wound output when being hit in melee (plaguetouched). I like them.

Plus he comes with a Feculent Gnarlmaw.

Hi all, what about Clan Pstilens right now? Is it any good? Any improvements seen in the past 3 months? Or is this army full of drawbacks and downsides?

I do not think so, because it is a Maggotkin of Nurgle Battalion. Another question: What allies are allowed to use? I can´t find any information in my battletome. Do I overlook something? Last question: Do you see any outstanding synergies within this faction?

THanks all for participating and for all your ideas presented. Just to answer a few of them: I own such an army but I do not like the playstyle. To be honest I´d like to have something more killy... Yeah, a really cool one. Never thought about Gnoblars. Definetly I have to have a deeper look... I have to have a look on the battletome. Sounds nice. This one I really like. Though I´m not sure wether its any good on the battlefield... Thsi one is the best one right now. Though the Lord of Change is not the prettiest of all greater Daemons... But I LOVE Flamers and Brimstones. Never thought about Brimstones... This one is cool, yes, but I don´t like the Dryads. Sorry. Startetd this last year, didn´t like the painting, sold everything. An army based on Steam Tanks is something very appealing. Unfortunately I couldn´t find the units I like to accompany the tanks. But I´m still thinking... Well, I´d rather run a horde of Bullgors led by some Keepers. But this doesn´t really count as big guys surrounded by small dudes...

I can confirm.

Yeah, I kew somewhat will come and point out that extreme points changes like you did. And you´re right, my topic missed, that almost everything will be good / great if the points cost is just 1 point. But saving 20 points on a single model in a 2000 points game won´t offer you any benefits (besides the fact that you can now include THAT important battalion as well as THAT cool model), especially if it isn´t a model that´s worth to be spammed. Oh, btw, I know what the term "points based game" does mean...

Hi all, I´m searching for a new project and due to aesthetics I like some big cool looking centerpieces surrounded by a crowd of smalish dudes. Some examples are: Great Unclean Ones with lots of PLaguebearers and Nurglings a swarm of sqiug herds with some Mangler Squigs Something like this. Well, what do you think: which faction could run such a theme pretty well? Any ideas / advice? Thanks in advance HTG

As written by someone else you can just run everything under Tzeentch Allegiance then. Though there is some shift in battleline units. Under Tzeentch Allegiance only your Chaos Warriors count as battleline. Other generic battleline could be Pink Horrors or Chaos Marauders. Though there is still the possibility of getting other battleline units depending on your Tzeentch build. For example there is a host that allows Flamers as battleline. Personally I´m about to go that route: Building a Tzeentch force including StD units that has Flamers as battleline. Varanguard and Knights will be my melee units while I will choose some Sorcerers from both books. (I do not think that this will give me the meta breaking army, it just offers all the models I really like in one army.) Honestly I never understood that kind of thinking. What will 20 pts less do for you in a 2000 pts battle? Your army won´t be in a better tier then. If something offers bad rules, no points reduction would make it "playable". And if something already is playable, it won´t increase in power by dropping some points. I know that an argument can be made about "power to points ratio" and in that way less points seem to increase the overall "power to poijnts ratio", but this just is some theory. I would never invest in something that only became cheaper (without a rules change) if I didn´t already think it offers any kinf of usefulness.

The Mark of Nurgle does nothing for the list. In fact, Mark of Khorne would be much better because you can get an additional shooting phase then. @all: What are the benefits of Legion of Chaos Ascendant? Why not just Grand Alliance Chaos instead?

I have to disagree with the above 2 comments. Tzeentch does nothing for Spawns besides producing some more during the course of a game. And Beasts of Chaos, well, here the Spawns are support pieces. Although they can buff themselves by the command ability, it costs cp and the buff isn´t that great for a low model count unit. IMO there are far better bonuses you can give them: THey are mortal, Slaves to Darkness, therefore can be included in each in every StD Battalion available, giving them some nice options. I think that either Plaguetouched or Ruinbringers is the way to go here. Ruinbringers boosts offense, while Plaguetouched somewhat boosts defense, though the Spawns won´t live longer but the opponent will get wounds when attacking your Spawns. I also think that Mark of Khorne or Mark of Nurgle are the best Marks you can give them, because both offer nice support abilities. (see below). On the other hand, there are some cool synergies inside StD warscrolls: attack twice (Chaos Lord on foot), rerollable save rolls (Chaos Sorcerer Lord of any kind), rerollable to hit and to wound rolls via Chaos Sorcerer Lord on foot spell, rerollable to wound rolls (Chaos Chosen). WArshrine gives you bonuses depending on the chosen Mark of Chaos. A special mention: Daemonprince of Nurgle´s comand ability causes D3 mortal wounds on every unmodified to hit roll of 6 on the attacking unit which is just awesome. Other than the Marks of Chaos, their mortal, Slaves to Darkness keywords offer a lot of possible synergies that can only be used in either StD Allegiance or any of the god specific Allegiances like Maggotkin of Nurgle or Blades of Khorne. I do not know the Slaanesh book, therefore can´t say anything about it, but ... Disciples of Tzeentch: no synergies with Spawns whatsoever. Everything is bound to either Daemon or Arcanites keywords. The one advantage (producing more Spawns) can be achieved by just use the Magister as an ally. Blades of Khorne: Spawns can get rerollable charge rolls (Lord of Khorne), +1 attack (Bloodsecrator, Aspiring Deathbringer, Wrathmongers), reroll ones to wound ( Lord of Khorne on Juggy), no battleshock (Exalted Deathbringer), +3 to run and charges as well as rerollable to wound rolls (Bloodstoker). MSU (multiple small units) Spawns enhance your Blood Tithe gains. Spawns can be targetet by Khorne Prayers. Maggotkin of Nurgle: Spawns can get a 5++ save after save (Harbinger of Decay), -1 to hit by enemy´s shooting (Lord of Blights), run and charge (Feculent Gnarlmaw), rerollable to wound rolls (Orgoth Daemonspew), +1 attack (Glottkin). Can be affected by various spells (+1 to wounds characteristics (Glottkin) or mortal wounds on to hit rolls of 6+, just to name a few). Can also be affected by the cycle of corruption (allegiance ability), ie healing, higher movement, +1 to to-wound rolls. Though there are also some anti-synergies if run as Nurgle Allegiance. There is an artifact that forces the enemy to reroll to hit rolls of 6. Cycle of corruption has an affect that forces the enemy to reroll to wound rolls of 6. Both of them do not work well if you´re also going to get the most out of StD synergies (Nurgle Daemonprince´s command ability, Plaguetouched Warband gains). Conclusion: If you´re heading towards Blades of Khorne or Maggotkin of Nurgle you can get 2 layers of support abilities / buffs: one layer by the Allegiance abilities, one by the synergies that can be found on the StD warscrolls. You can also head towards running StD Allegiance, that way you can get additional bonuses by adding some allies (Harbinger of Decay or Bloodstoker just to name a few). Does this make Chaos Spawns any good? NO! All the named buffs can also target MArauders, which are just faster (on average rolls), more lethal (more attacks per points, rend), more durable (more wounds per points).

Regarding the 90 pts to spare: a unit of 10 Chaos Warhounds is 80 pts, fits all requirements for allies and is one super cheap screen / rather speedy unit. I love them! And as already mentioned by someone else, a Bloodstoker is a great support piece, especially for the chariots because it enhances their MW output after charging.

Would you like to share your standard setup, please? Just assembling my first unit of Varanguard I´m heavily considering a mounted force of Knights and Varanguard now.

Well, in my opinion there are plenty of synergies found on the warscrolls of most StD units. You already named Chaos Lord. Chaos Sorcerer Lord comes to mind, too. Some of the mounted characters offer buffs for cavalry. Archaon buffing Varanguard also works. And that´s just from memory. If you run a list full of StD units in one of the God-themed armies you almost get a second layer of synergy. Sounds good. Go for it. Since the release of Battletome DoT I have been thinking about an all mounted StD army under Tzeentch allegiance, but I couldn´t find some list I like the look of right now.

Bullgors or Varanguard? Hi all, just wanted to get your opinion on wether to run Bullgors or Varanguard. I want to field a rather low model count, somewhat elitish army that basically consists of Flamers, Exalted Flamers and either Bullgors (phantasmagoria of fate battalion) or Varanguard (maybe the Varanguard battalion, I´m not sure yet). Reasons are I love these models. Though I´m currently not able to decide wether to run Bullgors or Varanguard. That´s why I like to know your opinions here. I´m leaning more towards Bullgors, but they do not really scale, meaning I´m not able to field Bullgors + battalion in smaller games. This has to be a 2000 pts list. On the other hand, Varanguard offer Tzeentch keyword on their warscroll, meaning I can run them even in the smallest games. Or should I get a unit of Varanguard for smaller games and build a 2000pts force based Bullgors? So many decisions... Any advice you like to share? Thanks in advance

I don´t see a problem here. It´s a unit that took 11 wounds, therefore the modifier is 11. Why do you ask that question?

That or Kairic Acolytes as Battleline. These would give you higher numbers. Flamers seem to be the definition of a glas cannon with their 20 pts per wound on a 5+ save.

Hi, just a short question: I read somewhere that Flamers can be battleline now. Which of the Covens offer that rule? Can this be combined with the Changehost Battalion?

Why don´t you just run Depraved Battalion full of Minotaur–alikes in Slaanesh Allegiance? Underwhelming + overpowered = nice to play? At least it´s the route I´m going to go now...

In addition: have a look at the Bloodstoker warscroll! As I read it, it also buffs the steeds...