For those of you who like to see pretty pictures of painted miniatures…they are coming. Paint has been applied to models recently after a couple of weeks break, so stay tuned. In the meantime more gaming thoughts.
I've spent the last week musing over the Plague Marine performances against Bull's Dark Angels, scrutinising each unit in an attempt to devise something totally effective and completely evil. For the purposes of this particular musing I will be using 2000 points as a game size.
LIST 1
Here's the list I used in the last game:
Typhus
Plague Marines x8, plasma guns x2, power axe x1
Plague Zombies x35
Heldrake
Forgefiend
Defiler
Land Raider, extra armour, dozer blade, dirge caster
(Iron Warrior Allies)
Sorcerer, Psych Lvl 3
Chaos Marines x7, plasma gun x1, power axe x1, Rhino, extra armour, dozer blade
Chaos Marines x7, plasma gun x1, power axe x1, Rhino, extra armour, dozer blade
Predator, Lascannon sponsons, extra armour
As you can see I've drifted away from an all-Nurgle list in order to cram more models (and Heavy Support) in there. The Iron Warrior allies also allow some cheaper troops in there to support the Plague Marines and zombies. On the day it worked pretty well – an IW unit rolled up and pinched the relic objective while the big units were thrown into Bull's face to deal with.
LIST 2
Based upon my findings over the last week I composed this next list as an opener. It pretty much takes my favourite units and duplicates them. There's not a lot of heavy weapons that I can bring to bear but certainly a lot of models:
Typhus
Terminators x7
Mark of Nurgle, Veterans of the long war, heavy flamer, twin lightning claws x1, gift of mutation
Mark of Nurgle, Veterans of the long war, heavy flamer, twin lightning claws x1, gift of mutation
Plague Marines x7
Veterans of the long war, plasma gun x2, power axe x1, gift of mutation
Rhino, dozer blade, dirge caster
Veterans of the long war, plasma gun x2, power axe x1, gift of mutation
Rhino, dozer blade, dirge caster
Plague Marines x7
Veterans of the long war, plasma gun x2, power axe x1, gift of mutation
Rhino, dozer blade, dirge caster
Veterans of the long war, plasma gun x2, power axe x1, gift of mutation
Rhino, dozer blade, dirge caster
Plague Zombies x35
Plague Zombies x35
Heldrake
Heldrake
Forgefiend
Forgefiend
I love this list. It may never win a tournament but it's very fluffy with all those units of 7 (or multiples of) and has 96 models in it. Between the zombies and the Heldrakes chaos will ensue, maybe even enough for the Plague marines to do their thing. By giving everyone the Veterans bonus they have Hatred towards Space Marines which will no doubt help. It is troop heavy and light on the heavy weapons, so cracking vehicles may be an issue but I'd be happy taking this to a tournament for a laugh.
LIST 3
This list picks up on some of the things I've been talking about but stays very much Nurgle:
Chaos Lord
Mark of nurgle, sigil of corruption, gift of mutation, power weapon, veterans of the long war
Mark of nurgle, sigil of corruption, gift of mutation, power weapon, veterans of the long war
Daemon Prince
Mark of nurgle, wings, armour, brand of skalathrax
Mark of nurgle, wings, armour, brand of skalathrax
Hellbrute, twin-linked lascannon, missile launcher
Hellbrute, reaper autocannon
Hellbrute, reaper autocannon
Plague Marines x7
Plasma gun x2, power axe x1, Rhino, havoc launcher
Plasma gun x2, power axe x1, Rhino, havoc launcher
Plague Marines x7
Plasma gun x2, power axe x1, Rhino, havoc launcher
Plasma gun x2, power axe x1, Rhino, havoc launcher
Plague Marines x7
Plasma gun x2, power axe x1, Rhino, havoc launcher
Plasma gun x2, power axe x1, Rhino, havoc launcher
Heldrake
Forgefiend
Predator, twin-linked lascannon, lascannon sponsons
The Daemon Prince with his wings and Brand becomes a mini Heldrake and the two can support each other (until they get shot down). The Hellbrutes could be thrown out there with the Forgefiend to create multiple high-threat targets so that the solid core of Plague Marines can get on with things.
I don't think any one of these lists is the finished article but I do like elements of each. Going all-out with one particular chaos god is always going to be expensive pointswise, but things like chaos cultists and the plague zombies can help there. Of course we have the imminent new Daemons codex which will make a great addition to the Chaos Marine book, so maybe I should hang on for a little while before committing to a list just yet.