Preparing for Death Guard

[wulfgar hammerfist]

I understand that Mortarion shouldn't be the only focus here but, frankly, he is the only thing in the list that I am truly concerned with. The rest of the army hasn't changed too much. A DG army without Mortarion will contain the usual suspects of Typhus, a daemon prince or two, hordes of pox walkers, a few plague marines, and the scuttle bug vehicles for fire support and cover buffs. DG without Mortarion will most likely play for board control and zoning out objectives. Mortarion lists will boost him into your lines and distract you with killy-ness while the rest of the army secures objectives.

[Jarl Caldersson]

I understand that Mortarion shouldn't be the only focus here but, frankly, he is the only thing in the list that I am truly concerned with. The rest of the army hasn't changed too much. A DG army without Mortarion will contain the usual suspects of Typhus, a daemon prince or two, hordes of pox walkers, a few plague marines, and the scuttle bug vehicles for fire support and cover buffs. DG without Mortarion will most likely play for board control and zoning out objectives. Mortarion lists will boost him into your lines and distract you with killy-ness while the rest of the army secures objectives.

 

but you should, as we've explained the DG buff/protect morti as much as he buffs them. They have great psynergy that will take more than "point those lascannons at morti".

[Yoyo ninja]

If people don't object to going outside the space wolves, what about some Deathwatch? Vengeance bolter rounds will bring the deathshroud down to their 4++/5+++. A single squad with bolters in a rhino shouldn't set you back to many points either.

Just a thought to getting a lot of -2ap shots on target.

[Karhedron]

AP-2 is definitely a sweet spot for dealing with Deathshroud so anything that can churn this out in volume is worth considering but wil still only be wounding on a 5+. However if you are going to Deathwatch you would be better off going for Hellfire rounds. The ability to wound anything (even Morty himself) on a 2+ will probably be worth more mileage, even against 2+ saves.

 

Even from the SW arsenal, plasma is worth considering. When overcharged it will wound pretty much everything in the DG on a 3+ and cut them down to their invulnerable saves. Even against single-wound models it is worth overcharging so they have to make twice as many disgustingly resilient rolls. Plasma-spam is not hard to do for SWs and you can always bring some Hellblasters if you feel the need. They can double-tap their Plasma Incinerators from 15" meaning that most DG units will not be able to get within 7" of them during their subsequent movement phase for their mortal wound shenanigans to kick in.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Played a game last night against DG and let them use Mort. Ripped them to shreds by turn 4.

[Karhedron]

Played a game last night against DG and let them use Mort. Ripped them to shreds by turn 4.

Pics or it didn't happen.

 

Seriously though, any info on the battle would be good. What did you both take? What worked well for each side and what didn't? We need details.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

I had a couple assassins and they did great. Long Fangs and Preds were A team.

[Bulwyf]

How would you have done without using the assassins?

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

The Cullexus was a lynch pin... opponent really didn't like it. But hey when you are fighting a Primarch you do what you gotta do.

[Closet Skeleton]

Sadly from what I read, real life Vikings were a hygenic bunch even if they didn't use soap,

 

 

Vikings did use soap, just not very good soap unless they were able to trade with the arabs.

 

http://www.ehow.co.uk/how_6528425_make-viking-soap.html

[Jarl Caldersson]

 

Sadly from what I read, real life Vikings were a hygenic bunch even if they didn't use soap,

 

 

Vikings did use soap, just not very good soap unless they were able to trade with the arabs.

 

http://www.ehow.co.uk/how_6528425_make-viking-soap.html

 

 

 

yeah they were much more hygenic than most of their european counterparts. i was jesting at the stereotype of "dirty barbarians!". IIRC the SW were pretty clean despite their appearance. waxing beards to remain braided and no frayed hairs. Cleaning weapons during off time, despite people thinking we do not. etc etc/

[Yoyo ninja]

While the deathshroud might be a pain in the bum on the field, the minis look great. At least we will have something good to look at while we are getting whooped by Morty!

[Kasper_Hawser]

While the deathshroud might be a pain in the bum on the field, the minis look great. At least we will have something good to look at while we are getting whooped by Morty!

 

Yeah I hate to admit it, but if I have to lose, I prefer to lose to a very elaborate and detailed painted models as oppose to the damn easy to paint and overpowered Necrons (well, in 7th Edition anyway) who only need 3 colors to be good. (Black, silver and green for most part). Contrast to the elaborate mutations from the plaguemarines to the pox walkers, one of which looks like The Lizard from Spiderman, coat and all.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Here is a batrep with optimized SW list versus nu DG. DG player even went for the razorback bait with Mort.

 

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/739921.page

[Kasper_Hawser]

Here is a batrep with optimized SW list versus nu DG. DG player even went for the razorback bait with Mort.

 

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/739921.page

 

And once again, Space Wolves are smashed. for the love of God, is there any video batrep for Space Wolves that DOESN'T end up with a loss? Thanks for posting a battle report which FAILS to give hope to the Wolves.

 

Had my first game against new DG, small one of 1000 points.

 

My list: (patrol detachment)

Wolf Lord on bike with master crafted bolter and powerfist

Rune Priest with Jaws on bike

One Squad of Plasma GH with Razorback AC

9 blood claws on foot with flamer and combi flamer and fist

Predator with HB and Autocannon loadout

Vindicator with the works

 

DG list: (battaltion)

Typhus

Daemon prince with Miasma and the relic armour

The Bellringer dude

About 40 pox walkers, 2 X 20.

8 or 9 Plague Marines with 1 plasma gun and two blight launchers in Rhino

Hellbrute with Multimelta

 

Set up: 4 X 4, 3 objectives with 1 right in the middle. 

 

I pretty much camped on the furthest corner with a Predator, AC Razorback and Vindicator as my main firepower. Not the best loadout but I just wanted to try a Vindicator for once. 

 

Sigh, wasn't enough. Took the combined firepower of the Predator, Razor and Vindicator just to wipe the plague marines which disembarked on first turn. by the time I finished the poxwalkers, the Daemon Prince and Hellbrute was upon me. I held the Blood Claws back for as long as I could before charging at the DP but to my horror, he made his Rhino explode and took out a big chunk of the Claws and wounded my characters. My Wolf Lord might have been able to hold the DP at bay, but as expected, the DP made his saves which in turn, caused him to fart a lot of mortal wounds back on the Wolf Lord.

 

A brutal loss but educational enough. The Vindicator was OK, but I think what I should have used was the Whirlwind instead which was a bit cheaper and would have given me more troop bodies, maybe add a terminator sergeant to the blood claws. The Wolf Lord maybe i'll switch to plasma pistol and Thunder hammer. Storm shield isn't a good investment I feel due to the damn mortal wound farts.

 

Or maybe I should ditch the Wolf Lord altogether for another Rune Priest..... No, the Wold Lord is important. to make sure the vehicles hit. But maybe I'll put him in jump pack instead. Easier to fit him and zip across the board over obstacles.

 

Live and learn, but for the love of God again, I wish I had more examples of Wolves giving a good fight and actually winning sometimes.

[Brother Hellion]

Live and learn, but for the love of God again, I wish I had more examples of Wolves giving a good fight and actually winning sometimes.

 

The all father heard your prays for yesterday I won a game against Deathguard. Again.

 

DG list: Typhius (warlord)

             2x Malignant Plaguecasters obsessed with smits and plague winds

             Noxious Blightbringer armed with plasma pistols

             2x 20 man Poxwalkers

             10 man Plaguebearer unit

             2x 10 man plaguemarines with plasma gun, champion with plasma pistol, plague knives

             Foetide blight drone with plague spreader

             Nurgle Defiler with chest battle cannon, reaper autocannon.

             separate detachment: Heldrake

 

Wolves of Catachan: Runepriest on bike with plasma pistol and runic armor (warlord; my alt for my avatar)

                                  Wolf priest on foot, bear minimum points. 

                                  2x TWC with frost swords and SS; packleader in one unit has frost ax.

                                  2x 6 man GH with plasma gun and WGPL armed to Combi-plasma

                                  1x Five man GH pack with plasma gun and wolf standard.

                                  Five man Wulfen pack with PL armed to Frostclaws, one Great frost ax, 3x Th/ss

                                  Five man Long fangs with 2x missles and 2x heavy bolters

                                  Dreadnaught with twin lascannon, great claw and heavy flamer

                                  2x Razorbacks with twin assault cannons

                                  Land raider with twin assault cannon and 2x hurricane bolters (couldn't afford melta)

Mission: Object secure (each side has one objective worth 3pts at endgame; warlord, firstblood, linebreaker) 2k points. Deployment: Spearhead.

 

Game went five turns with myself going first. I set up fire lanes with the razorbacks and raider while TWC acted as fences between my packs and the stumbling undead. Dread got lucky with the lascannon on the heldrake dealing six wounds. On his turn, typhus and poxwalkers had to advance due to most of his formation being on the left flank waay in the back. Deflier killed two out of three of my first TWC. Heldrake moves up but fails to wound with that baleflamer. Then engages cc with other TWC and manages to kill a wolf. Remaining TWC lash back dealing two wounds.

 

Turn two I disengage my TWC from heldrake to allow my GHs and Dreadnaught the honor of the first kill. Wulfen rush forward from Raider along with wolf priest to engage the Deflier in assault. Raider and other razorback pick off plaguemarines/poxwalkers. Long fangs support with heavy bolters. Lone TWC Packleader with frost ax charges into poxs for glorious death. Plaguecasters and Blightcaller join in fight with deflier to try and kill my Wulfen. One dies from plague caster's smit plus mortal wound from 7+ successful cast. However, Wulfen kill deflier in two turns then finish off casters and blightcaller in subsquent turn. 

 

Game ends after Typus engaged the wulfen and was smashed in the face by a thunderhammer. Blighted drone was picked off by assault cannon fire while long fangs and the left flank handled the remaining pox walkers. 

[Kasper_Hawser]

Live and learn, but for the love of God again, I wish I had more examples of Wolves giving a good fight and actually winning sometimes.

 

The all father heard your prays for yesterday I won a game against Deathguard. Again.

 

DG list: Typhius (warlord)

             2x Malignant Plaguecasters obsessed with smits and plague winds

             Noxious Blightbringer armed with plasma pistols

             2x 20 man Poxwalkers

             10 man Plaguebearer unit

             2x 10 man plaguemarines with plasma gun, champion with plasma pistol, plague knives

             Foetide blight drone with plague spreader

             Nurgle Defiler with chest battle cannon, reaper autocannon.

             separate detachment: Heldrake

 

Wolves of Catachan: Runepriest on bike with plasma pistol and runic armor (warlord; my alt for my avatar)

                                  Wolf priest on foot, bear minimum points. 

                                  2x TWC with frost swords and SS; packleader in one unit has frost ax.

                                  2x 6 man GH with plasma gun and WGPL armed to Combi-plasma

                                  1x Five man GH pack with plasma gun and wolf standard.

                                  Five man Wulfen pack with PL armed to Frostclaws, one Great frost ax, 3x Th/ss

                                  Five man Long fangs with 2x missles and 2x heavy bolters

                                  Dreadnaught with twin lascannon, great claw and heavy flamer

                                  2x Razorbacks with twin assault cannons

                                  Land raider with twin assault cannon and 2x hurricane bolters (couldn't afford melta)

Mission: Object secure (each side has one objective worth 3pts at endgame; warlord, firstblood, linebreaker) 2k points. Deployment: Spearhead.

 

Game went five turns with myself going first. I set up fire lanes with the razorbacks and raider while TWC acted as fences between my packs and the stumbling undead. Dread got lucky with the lascannon on the heldrake dealing six wounds. On his turn, typhus and poxwalkers had to advance due to most of his formation being on the left flank waay in the back. Deflier killed two out of three of my first TWC. Heldrake moves up but fails to wound with that baleflamer. Then engages cc with other TWC and manages to kill a wolf. Remaining TWC lash back dealing two wounds.

 

Turn two I disengage my TWC from heldrake to allow my GHs and Dreadnaught the honor of the first kill. Wulfen rush forward from Raider along with wolf priest to engage the Deflier in assault. Raider and other razorback pick off plaguemarines/poxwalkers. Long fangs support with heavy bolters. Lone TWC Packleader with frost ax charges into poxs for glorious death. Plaguecasters and Blightcaller join in fight with deflier to try and kill my Wulfen. One dies from plague caster's smit plus mortal wound from 7+ successful cast. However, Wulfen kill deflier in two turns then finish off casters and blightcaller in subsquent turn. 

 

Game ends after Typus engaged the wulfen and was smashed in the face by a thunderhammer. Blighted drone was picked off by assault cannon fire while long fangs and the left flank handled the remaining pox walkers. 

 

Thanks mate. Need more details, but I'm glad for some good news finally post DG codex. Write a longer reply later.

[Kasper_Hawser]

http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2017/09/40k-next-imperial-primarch.html

 

I really don't want Russ to come back yet. Let the screw ups of the Dark Imperium continue to be dumped on Grand daddy papa smurf or another primarch, not Leman Russ. As much as I want a super CQC loyalist Primarch that can take on daemon primarchs, for the sake of our collective snouts, we don't want any stigma that comes with a resurrected/returned primarch.

 

Not to mention if we get our primarch, then for once, people will start pointing at the Wolves and scream cheese just like Guilliman and the smurfs, Mortarion and his puss filled buddies and Magnus with his space persians/egyptions.

[Kasper_Hawser]

Hi guys, just bumping this up to check if anyone has good games (by good, have games which show that Wolves have a reasonable chance of fighting new DG even if its not a victory) as of late. In particular, any good combos with our existing armoury. I rather not have allies, but as long as majority of army were Wolves with a token assassin or small allied detachment, i guess its OK too. been thinking of borrowing a small detachment of a friend's IG to act as my heavy support.

[Lars the Red]

To add my part to this saga, I have a terrible loss to report, with some ideas on some things that worked. 

 

I fought against a demon heavy deathguard army which included Mortarion last night. Just from Memory his list was something like this;

Mortarion

2 winged demon princes

Herald of Nurgle

Some demon character that gave table wide bonuses to all his units whenever a demon killed a model (after killing 7 models the thing gave +1 to his toughnesses, -1 to hit, re-rolling 1's to hit and for saves.)

29 pox walkers

3 bodyguard terminators

3 obliterators

3 plague drones

2 units of 3 bases of nurglings

a bloat drone

I think that's it 

 

here's my list:

Bjorn

an Iron priest (the warlord)

wolf guard battle leader

blizzdred

5 wolf scouts with meltagun and 2 plasma pistols

3 units of 5 grey hunters

2 TLAC razorbacks

2 units of long fangs, 1 w/missiles, 1 w/lascannons

Stormfang with 2 las cannons and heavy bolters

Predator annhilator

 

Scenario was the Relic

 

My turn 1;

I moved up with most everything that would need to move and fired, re-rolling 1's on hits and wounds thanks to Bjorn and the Battle leader. Didn't do very much real damage. Most of the wounds were either saved by the inv save or the Disgustingly reslient save. My wolf scouts came in behind the demon character and took half of his wounds between shooting and getting a charge off

 

His turn 1;

he moves up everything, did psychics and shot a little bit and then takes out the scouts and the lascannon long fangs. Then he charges Mortaring and one of the demon princes into the Stormfang. (this is the good part) I rolled more 6's than i deserved to and managed to peel off 11 of 18 wounds from Mortarion. His bodyguards were not able to be that close yet as they had teleported in and had to stay 9" away. The Stormfang then got worked over and went down in flames, losing a grey hunter in the crash. at this point the bonus is maxed out on his character because it was all demons that did a lot of the damage. He also had a unit of nurglings around the relic.

 

My turn 2:

Everything that needed to moved up I did a lot of shooting and grey hunters got out of transports. attempted more shooting. didn't do very much thanks to the bonuses. charged the plague drones with the blizz dread and the grey hunters charged the nurglings. at this point I was just trying to nab the relic and run off with it. Mortarion did a heroic intervention and got in with the grey hunters. He then had some ability that let him do wounds to anyone w/in 7" of Morty. then of course Morty killed the unit of grey hunters after the grey hunters killed the nurglings. 

 

HIs turn 2:

He moves forward and now has everything almost to the middle. He also dropped in his obliteraters. His shooting didn't do very much. Morty charges the 2nd unit of grey hunters who have the relic. They got erased and then my blizzdred took out the plague drones. also his demon princes moved up and then charged my tanks. 

 

turn 3;

in this turn my shooting once again didn't do much. I charged with everything I could and Bjorn ended up getting killed by Morty. the last unit of grey hunters got smited away. at the end of his turn 3 after charges, shooting etc.. all I had left was a damaged razorback engaged in combat and the blizzdred with 2 wounds taken off. and his pox walkers had the objective. At this point there was no way that I could have killed enough units that would have been in the way for the Dread to get to the pox walkers and kill them to make them drop the relic. 

 

Conclusion;

it was pretty disappointing that everything he had had so many bonuses. everytime you felt like you were getting something done he'd drop enough 5's and 6's to cancel out a lot of the shooting. Shooting at Morty with the Stormfang and the Predator could have gone a lot better. He killed the stormfang just as it was going to swoop over to take out that character giving the bonuses. Those bonuses did a lot to help him. His bodyguard soaked up a bunch of the damage when they got close enough too. All in all it was a lesson in frustration.

 

- Lars

[Karhedron]

Facing a big powerful unit like Morty in The Relic is really tough as there is only one objective and if you opponent can park his MVP on top of it, there is no easy way to win unless you have a similarly potent unit to throw against it. Mortarion with Deathshroud is tougher to shift than curry stains on a white shirt.

 

You are right that invulnerable saves and disgustingly resilient are an evil combo, it makes it feel like it is not worth rolling the dice sometimes. The best suggestion I can give is multi-wound weapons (overcharging plasma is good here, particularly if you have Bjorn for rerolls). At least it gives you double the chance that you opponent will fail a DR roll and force some damage through.

 

I would replace the Predator with 2 lascannon Razorbacks. Only a couple more points and nearly twice the wounds. Some psychic support might be worth considering as Smite is one of the best ways to cut through the Deathshroud. Tempest's wrath will take the sting out of Morty's attacks a bit and a psyker will also let you deny some of his powers.

 

Overall though there is not much more I can suggest. The Relic was probably the toughest mission you could play against that army.

[Kasper_Hawser]

Facing a big powerful unit like Morty in The Relic is really tough as there is only one objective and if you opponent can park his MVP on top of it, there is no easy way to win unless you have a similarly potent unit to throw against it. Mortarion with Deathshroud is tougher to shift than curry stains on a white shirt.

 

You are right that invulnerable saves and disgustingly resilient are an evil combo, it makes it feel like it is not worth rolling the dice sometimes. The best suggestion I can give is multi-wound weapons (overcharging plasma is good here, particularly if you have Bjorn for rerolls). At least it gives you double the chance that you opponent will fail a DR roll and force some damage through.

 

I would replace the Predator with 2 lascannon Razorbacks. Only a couple more points and nearly twice the wounds. Some psychic support might be worth considering as Smite is one of the best ways to cut through the Deathshroud. Tempest's wrath will take the sting out of Morty's attacks a bit and a psyker will also let you deny some of his powers.

 

Overall though there is not much more I can suggest. The Relic was probably the toughest mission you could play against that army.

 

Actually I think against any horde or semi horde army, the Relic have us beat.  Especially if they're the first to touch the relic.

[Gherrick]

Two suggestions come to mind: storm fang should never leave home without twin-melta, and when using 2+ long fang units, split up the ML and LC so you always have some of both left if they wipe one of them (now that everyone has split fire, there's no downside).

 

I could suggest also that you make Bjorn the warlord, and let of have the 6+FNP that stacks with his built-in 5+FNP, just to give him that extra bit of survivability.

 

One other idea: bring 2-3 cyberwolves (all in 1 model units) to use as deep strike counter measures. They are SO worth their points.

[Karhedron]

when using 2+ long fang units, split up the ML and LC so you always have some of both left if they wipe one of them (now that everyone has split fire, there's no downside).

 

 

Whilst anyone can split fire, remember that Long Fangs get a bonus when they focus fire.

 

One other idea: bring 2-3 cyberwolves (all in 1 model units) to use as deep strike counter measures. They are SO worth their points.

3 Cyberwolves can be run as an Outrider detachment if you put an HQ with them which nets you an extra CP.

[Lars the Red]

Rrplacing the pred is probably a good idea. I would probably start the long fangs in there for trying to get first turn. I could see where having them would have helped.

 

I actually made it to the relic first, I just didn't get to hoof it out of there before Morty jumped the grey hunters.

 

I usually do bring meltas on the storm fang. But I was too tight on points and I wanted to use the Heavy bolter shots on the shambling horde of plague things. Same with psykers. I ran out of points before I could fit em in.

 

I made the iron priest the warlord so he would be more survivable so he could follow Bjorn around and heal him. It actually worked out pretty good. I might try it again just to test it more. cyber wolves is a good idea, but then that's a higher count of units which means you are more likely to go second. I'd rather play to try to go first. If they can start off in transports though, then spread out from there that would work. I'll need to revisit my list and see if I can fit that in. Another CP would be nice.

 

Thanks for the ideas. I'll have to see if I can get a rematch not playing for the relic.

 

-Lars