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should i scrap my list and start over due to new counters?


Phok Smoulder

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I recently bought 60 plaguebearers (last month) and now I'm only missing a couple of units from building my smite/pb wall list. my only issue is with each new primaris release, my army becomes worse and worse, and thats basically all anyone plays in my area. 

It seems the eliminators can wipe out all of my smite characters and support characters for the PB's and such, without even having LoS, and I can't do anything about it. 

Can anyone offer any advice for me to tweak my army to help deal with this kind of thing, or should I just scrap it and start over? 

I'm sure I can return them as they're all still in the plastic (other than the first box I began painting) but they're from element and I don't know the process. 

It just seems utterly pointless to me to spend all that time painting 60 PB's and doing tzeentch DP conversion for them to not be any good in my local meta. 

Honestly I'm a returning player who doesn't really know how to play properly any more, and I was told my a few people that this style list would be good for my playstyle, till the PB's got nerfed. 

am I seeing an indirect PB nerf here with how ultramarines work now. it seems to be everyone is gonna run 3x3 of those snipers and just kill all my psykers before I have a chance to do anything. 

needless to say this is really stressing me out here. I'm not made of money and I just dropped about 400 pounds on this army. I can't be having it get hard countered by every single army in my area. 

Ideally I'd like to just tweak my army to be able to counter these snipers, but I have no idea how to do it. 

I was going to just DS daemon on them, but apparently if they're screened from charging, this is useless. 

someone else recommended long range fire, but I know very little about this. 

hopefully you guys can help me out here as my head is ruined over this. 

the army is a pretty standard psychic plaguebearer list. I run bloodletters and pinks in the warp to deepstrike, and othert than the psykers I run contorted epitome and khorne DP. I'm happy changing stuff to get better results though. 

should I get 3 x deredeos with butcher canons or something and just try and blast them to bits?

Edited by Phok Smoulder
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this is my list btw, more or less. what could I change to help me deal with these character snipers, please? 
 

++ Battalion Detachment +5CP (Chaos - Daemons) [43 PL, 780pts, 7CP] ++
+ No Force Org Slot +
Battle-forged CP [3CP]
Chaos Allegiance: Chaos Undivided
Detachment CP [5CP]
Rewards of Chaos (1 Relic) [-1CP]
+ HQ +
Daemon Prince of Chaos [9 PL, 180pts]: Daemonic axe, Khorne, Skullreaver, Wings
The Contorted Epitome [10 PL, 195pts]: Symphony of Pain
+ Troops +
Bloodletters [8 PL, 150pts]: 19x Bloodletter, Bloodreaper, Instrument of Chaos
Horrors [12 PL, 225pts]: Daemonic Icon
. 30x Pink Horror
Horrors [4 PL, 30pts]: 10x Pair of Brimstone Horrors
 
++ Battalion Detachment +5CP (Chaos - Daemons) [35 PL, 689pts, 5CP] ++
+ No Force Org Slot +
Chaos Allegiance: Nurgle
Detachment CP [5CP]
+ HQ +
Poxbringer [4 PL, 70pts]: Miasma of Pestilence
Slopitty Bilepiper [4 PL, 95pts]
+ Troops +
Nurglings [3 PL, 54pts]: 3x Nurgling Swarms
Plaguebearers [12 PL, 235pts]: Daemonic Icon, Instrument of Chaos, 29x Plaguebearer, Plagueridden
Plaguebearers [12 PL, 235pts]: Daemonic Icon, Instrument of Chaos, 29x Plaguebearer, Plagueridden
 
++ Supreme Command Detachment +1CP (Chaos - Thousand Sons) [27 PL, 526pts, 1CP] ++
+ No Force Org Slot +
Detachment CP [1CP]
+ HQ +
Ahriman on Disc of Tzeentch [9 PL, 166pts]: Doombolt, Glamour of Tzeentch, Weaver of Fates
Daemon Prince of Tzeentch [9 PL, 180pts]: Diabolic Strength, Gaze of Fate, Malefic talon, Wings
Daemon Prince of Tzeentch [9 PL, 180pts]: 6. High Magister, Bolt of Change, Death Hex, Helm of the Third Eye, Malefic talon, Warlord, Wings
++ Total: [105 PL, 13CP, 1,995pts] ++
 

 

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This is why I never buy models to be competitive and just play with whatever. Chasing the meta is too expensive. If you have an army that abuses one rule then your opponents are going to grab the counter to that or learn to play less competitive games.

 

I played a 60 plague bearer and 3 daemon prince list recently at a tournament with my Imperial Fists. I have only 1 unit of Eliminators who did nothing but my 10 strong unit of Stalker Bolt Rifle intercessors with the 3cp snipe stratagem blasted a daemon prince apart on turn 1. I killed another one in combat with my power fist captain but the third got away. It was much worse version of your list and I only won by 1 point so I don't think you're automatically screwed.

 

I could never snipe the nurgle characters because they did out of line of sight. 9 Eliminators might be able to get around that but those shoot through walls executioner rounds are damage 1 so I wouldn't count on it and even then that's a going to take 3 heavy support choices to kill 1 nurgle herald a turn, only the regular 1d3 damage and mortal wounds rounds are going to threaten a daemon prince.

 

I've both won and lost to plague bearer lists many times and to be honest they don't need the buff characters. Plague Bearers have not been nerfed, they're still the most durable horde unit in the game that will outlast anti-horde firepower better than any other unit. There are a lot of lists that use 40-90 Plague Bearers, I'd suspect Thousand Sons psykers to be nerfed long before basic daemon infantry becomes a liability.

Edited by Closet Skeleton
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Agreed; rules come and go but models and armies you love are forever :) You're probably stressing over nothing, it's unlikely that people will be loading up on a certain unit and if they do the nerf bat will likely swing sooner or later... If they really stack lists against you then the conversation is more about the scope of your games (don't bring a tourney list to a casual game and vice-versa etc).

 

Plus if your meta is mostly Marines then I'd wager they're more concerned about countering that than your daemons ;)

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thanks guys. tbh I'm rather inexperienced when it comes to list building. I do like the models in this army though and it was a big factor in me building it. it just seems rather bad timing that space marines get cheap character assassins, and ways to more accurately deal with PB's. 

Not to mention PB's might get a nerf as well. 

At least I have the bonus of me actually being into chaos and liking the minis. 

My OP was a little pessimistic as I'd just spent a lot of money over the past 2 months buying a lot of stuff, and then suddenly it's countered and might not be as good now. 

I guess I should probably just finish the army and play some games and take it from there. 

I'm mainly fishing to see if people have started to change their lists to deal with some of the newer threats. As I am still needing to convert my khorne DP, buy the epitome and convert my 2nd tzeentch DP, and I still need 20 pinks and 10 brimstones. Maybe this stuff is going to be viable to cut and run a DG battalion or something with blightlords, or maybe even get some deredeos for a gunline or something. 

most of what I need now is not going to be that expensive though, only the Khorne DP as I have my eye on the FW one, and then putting manticore wings on it. It looks really good and tbh no kitbash is gonna come close to it, so it has to be done. 

I might as well just finish the list, maybe get myself 10 blightlords and make a nurgle DP as well (I already have blightspawn and stuff to add as well) apparently they are great to deepstrike in and cause a bit of trouble. 

I might have to make myself a nurgle terminator sorcerer as a reliable way of having arch contaminator on hand, but I guess I can start the DP in the warp and hopefully get them all down in the same turn. 

from what I've heard, the blightlords are great when utilised in this capacity. I also heard running them with typhus can be great, but if you don't get his charge off it's painful. I have typhus as well from conquest magazine, so I could totally try running him.

Hmm, might pick up a couple of boxes of blightlords next month then as alternate options. also I need them for my DG anyway. 

only issue then is I;m gonna be running a 3 book list as a newbie. ha ha. at least I have a friend who is willing to learn with me. so not as stressful. he's more advanced in terms of rules than I am so it should help. 

I won't be buying any more minis till next month anyway, so I have some time to work out my best course of action. 

Edited by Phok Smoulder
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I'm expecting a slight nerf to Plaguebearers but its probably going to be a point per model or change to the buff characters which would be a massive problem for lists with more than 60 plague bearers but I don't see that making 60 of them something not worth having to put down in a list.

 

One of the guys I see often in the English tournament circuit is trying Blightlords mixed into a daemon list but I haven't heard from him how he's doing yet. I might have the info in a month.

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Once you get more experience of building lists and more importantly playing them you'll feel a lot better - theoryhammer only goes so far after all! Especially playing with your friend who's starting out too, you can both play to learn together :) Don't forget to have a chat after the game too, talk about what you thought worked and didn't as there's no better alternative point of view of your army and game than from your opponent so you'll learn a lot more with his input :tu:

 

You can also start with small games with what you have painted first, it's a great way to really learn your army and adapt as you go :D

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thanks. 

yeah I plan on just playing some smaller games to start with to get a better fell for the structure of the game again. I should be able to pick a lot of it up fast again as I used to play as a kid, but a lot of it is new stuff so I have to start from the basics again. 

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It's quite convenient that necessity forces you to start with smaller games and work up to larger ones as you paint up more models ;) It's also why I usually recommend not getting too many boxes when starting out, lets you be more adaptive as sometimes what you expect to use/like isn't what you end up wanting to play :)

 

Same as how starting from the basics is a good plan, those of us who keep playing between editions can sometimes get a bit muddled with old rules! :lol: Don't forget to share your journey with us, with plenty of pictures :D

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To hell with the meta, I run a severely handicapped Slaaneshi marine list (I refuse to use Knights, Dinobots, Discolords etc because they are ever expensive money wise or just ugly minis) and Ill use it even though times are bad for Chaos players atm, because I love my army and have put a lot of time into it. You do what you want to do, metas come and go, but a glorious Chaos army is forever!!!!!!

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  • 3 weeks later...

I recently bought 60 plaguebearers (last month) and now I'm only missing a couple of units from building my smite/pb wall list. my only issue is with each new primaris release, my army becomes worse and worse, and thats basically all anyone plays in my area. 

[...]

 

the army is a pretty standard psychic plaguebearer list. I run bloodletters and pinks in the warp to deepstrike, and othert than the psykers I run contorted epitome and khorne DP. I'm happy changing stuff to get better results though. 

 

 

Hihi, I recently stopped playing PB spam due to the fact that it was too powerful in my all-Marines-meta. :D

 

To be more serious, nothing is wrong with your army right now. Lots of 40k games are won or lost by the scenario, not the sniping of some low wound characters. And shooting down 60 plaguebearers is not easy, even with the increased DAKKA from new Marines.

 

I play Daeomons for years now and at the start of 8th edition Daemons weren´t meant to be one of the stronger factions, but some players found ways to win with them...

 

If you really like the models, you should keep them and have fun painting and playing them.

 

If you really fear the snipers, you should have a look at those Terminator Sorcerers instead of the Daemon Princes. They offer better casting, some good shooting and the model is way easier to hide. Though you´re going to loose a lot of melee power then.

 

Or you go and get some "Distraction Carnifexes" ie any kind of big model that forces your opponent to shoot it. Great Unclean Ones, Nurgle Soulgrinders, Knights... Anything that looks dangerous but is able to tank lots of firepower.

 

And like already mentioned: you really don´t need your supporting characters. The most important one is the one that gives you +2 to movement and that is only really useful turn 1. So hide him out of line of sight and you´re good to go.

Have in mind that 9 Eliminators might kill a Daemon Prince per round, but it is just a Daemon Prince, not more. The game isn´t over then.

 

You can also deepstrike your characters whenever you need them, though it needs some cp.

 

To be honest, I much more fear the new drop pods and I really do not understand why my usual opponents haven´t bought them yet. 3-4 Droppods can severely hamper your movement which can be game changing. That´s the reason why I´d run more Nurglings when droppods will have their comeback.

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60 plaguebearers is a damn nightmare to eat through, even without character support. And characters can hide in buildings very easily...

 

Snipers are good, don't get me wrong. But its a specialist unit that won't work in all-comers very well. 1 unit does nothing, 3 units are a heavy investment. They don't like to move, can't survive melee...

 

I wouldn't worry :) it takes 10 games to even begin to grasp an army too, you got plenty of gaming ahead! Plaguebearers have been a staple unit for years, and I'm sure they will continue to be. Definitely not a wasted purchase

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  • 2 weeks later...

Yeah I've been playing a very similar list for some time now, except I don't take pink horrors and squeeze in more nurglings and Syll'esske.

 

I wouldn't worry about snipers too much in ITC, you should have enough LOS blocking to hide from a decent chunk of shooting. Even 3 squads of eliminators aren't going to chew through them all.

 

Have faced raven guard and although they made it tough by sniping out scriviner and Ahriman it was only for a turn then they are terrible at dealing with all the mele threats at once.

 

Plaguebearers are even better in the meta now because they don't care about AP and marines have all the AP they'll ever need.

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