# 1500 Chaos Daemons - H E L P ...being annihilated



## Azillith (Nov 7, 2008)

Hi Folk,
I have chosen to run Chaos Daemons as they have a great look and I really like the fluff as well.

However I mainly play against my housemate and he annihilates me by the 3rd turn most times... No fun, just slaughter. I have tried all different combos and NOTHING works... AND there is no way I could win... But I am hoping for a way to at least be able to play a fun game for 6 rounds... 1500 Point army should be able to give a fun few rounds...

His army list is:-
farseer x 2 Doom/Guide/SpiritStones Singnig Spear
20 Dire Avengers with Exarch, Bladestorm *2 Shuriken Catapault
3 Wave Serpent Spirit stones, Scatter Laser
2 Wraithlord Dual Flamers/ EML / BL
Howling Banshees x 10 exarch Mirror Swords

Not posting my list as I have about 15 I have tried with everything; so maybe if you can give me some advice as to what I should be running... Even the list that won Nationals recently here in SA gets pummelled to the ground by turn 3!!!

ONCE....I was lucky enough on my first turn lad to kill one of his WS with my SG, but that was just pure luck on the 6 role rear attack... Now he places his WS so I cannot Deepstrike behind him and once I am on the board he is too fast to get behind and nothing I can do from the front touches him...

The Doom/guide combo gives him 32 roles plus a re-role on hit which means he is usually wounding 18-23, not much can withstand that. By the end of my first turn I am lucky if I have any units left and when I arrive on wave 2 he annihilates the new arrivals just as effectively...

Not one of my units can stand up to his combined firepower and number of rolls and rerolls... Nor the OPness of his 3 WS and WL...

Is there ANY WAY I can hope to have a game against him that is not so pointless???


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## Daneel2.0 (Jul 24, 2008)

Ok, this would be easier if you included at least the models that you have available to you. That gives us some specifics that we can work with to start us off. :grin: I can give you some general advice though.

First I'm coming up short points for his list. Unless you missed something, or I did. 

Next, remember all your saves are invulnerable. This means that his low AP weapons and his power weapons don't really matter. You still get your saves. The high strength weapons are MUCH more important, so focus on those. While we are on the topic of saves, for Daemons cover saves are very important since your invulnerable save is so high in general. USE COVER to your advantage wherever you can.

When you deepstrike your first units onto the board, it pays to be aggressive. Drop your flamers w/in template range of a unit and then try to destroy it. Use the run ability to advance towards his units (or away if that is where the cover is). The weaker units should come onto the board in the second wave.

Don't forget about pieces like the Soul Grinder. It's absolutely devastating when used correctly. Speaking of which, you have a LOT of different units that can handle tanks. There are plenty of units that have rending, plus you have monstrous creatures with high strength, and HQ units that can all take care of vehicles.

Read through the tacticas here on Heresy. They are worth the time and effort.

That should help a little at least. If you post some specifics, I'll try to give more advice.


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## MaidenManiac (Oct 2, 2008)

Never played Daemons but have the list, this is what I come up with on that basis....:read:

I assume that he keeps all infantry mounted in their respective WS at the start of the game right?
You pop down with ½ and try to kill the transports and have a hard time doing it. He then moves a bit, unloads DAs and shoot the hell out of some poor Daemons?

Id try something like 2-3 DPs with MoT and Bolt of Tzeentch(and some more stuff ofc), they are as good as weapons gets vs WS's and some horrors to the first wave. Hopefully you shoot out atleast 1 WS and then your Horrors can do some fun on the pointy ears that just came out. Give one Horror Bolt too, in case you screw up with the monsters :wink:
Id toss in 2 Tzeentch Heralds too for 2 more bolts so you have some, even if you roll crap and get wave 2.

I assume that you run Daemonettes for the WLs?
I'd run 2 Heralds(pref in Charriots with transfix) some Daemonettes(Transfix) and Seekers(guess it ). Any of these can kill WLs, and also assault other pointy ears that happen to dabble within range.

In short many Tzeentchian units first wave with Bolts to kill WS's and an Slaneeshy unit or 2, and then Heralds wave 2 with some Flamers or so to (hopefully) kill whats forced out of transports :smoke:


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## newsun (Oct 6, 2008)

Run Fateweaver and match his re-rolls.
Flamers kill any unit w/o an invul save real well.
Focus on one unit at a time kill it dead. I would probably look to the farseer one since the re-rolls are nasty.
Depending on the size of the board and mission, you may want to string him out by DS far away so only his really fast units can get there quickly, then you can surround with reserves.
Nettes will take banshees if you get the charge, even still he does not get bonus attacks and if near FW you get re-rolls on all your saves.
Pie plates from SGs have a long range, enjoy that or get DPs and keep them near the re-roll master.

Just some thoughts, I have had trouble with Eldar before, I still need more matches against them before I can give any further advice.


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## Azillith (Nov 7, 2008)

*Long post - apologies*

Hi Folks, 

Thanks for all the replies... tried many different combos and then Drake suggested the list below. Did better than normal but game still ended in third round...

HQ 
Fateweaver, Oracle of Tzeentch 
Herald of Tzeentch	Bolt of Tzeentch, Master of Sorcery, We are Legion
Herald of Tzeentch	Bolt of Tzeentch, Master of Sorcery, We are Legion
TROOPS
8 Horrors of Tzeentch	Bolt of Tzeentch, Changeling
9 Horrors of Tzeentch	Bolt of Tzeentch
10 Plaguebearers	Chaos Icon
11 Plaguebearers	Chaos Icon
FAST ATTACK 
9 Flesh Hounds 
HEAVY SUPPORT 
Daemon Prince	Mark of Tzeentch, Iron Hide, Unholy Might, Bolt of Tzeentch, Instrument of Chaos

Ran Drake’s list – VERY Solid list but still could not touch the Eldars... I think I must just suck...

First round ran the army pretty evenly first strike and second...
First round:- His Wraithlords and wave serpents whipped out the Herald and the Horrors... Took damage on my Plagues and Fatewaever. (The Fateweaver having to take a leadership test for each re-role for every wound made him extremely easy to kill)

Second round I went in Hard and heavy in the first wave and troops second wave. I took out one of his Wraiths and one of his sniper groups: but he took all the Flesh-hounds – (they landed they died – behind cover), second Pinks and Prince plus he continued to hurt my Plagues, first and second group. With his setup 32 dice, plus a re-role for failed... Most time he is hitting me 27 shots –with saves I take about 15 hits on each unit.... very little can withstand that...

Third round I finished his banshees and he whipped out my Fateweaver, so basically game over. Nothing to really take on his Wave Serpents and Wraithlord... 
I ended up with:- 
4 Horrors
6 Plaguebearers
5 Plaguebearers
He ended up with:- 
3 Serpents, (one with one weapon blown up and Banshees all killed)
1 Wraithlord
One Farseer with Guide and Doom with a troop of Dire Avengers with Bladestorm. (In WS)
One Farseers with Guide and Doom with a troop of Dire Avengers with Bladestorm. (In WS)

We then played with me bringing in ALL the heavy hitters in the first wave and then troops second.
Pretty similar result...

Between the Wairthlords and the Wave Serpents cover does not count as they just shoot over the cover so no help there. PLUS they can shot from 24” to 60” so I have a distance disadvantage. The snipers are usually up high so most of the time they are hitting hard as well... By moving the WS I can only hit them on a 6.

Either I am really missing something big or he is just too OP. His WS with bright lancers and some plasma cannon, (Cant rememebr name), that he gets re-roles on... They do major damage every turn... His Wraithlords also shoot 2 HEAVY weapons and hit hard in CC AND with me having to role a six to touch them are hectically OP...

He shoots so many times over such a large distance that most times I lose units as they land or before they are within range to do anything to his units...

I think I must either give up or drop daemons...Neither of which I want to do...


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## Azillith (Nov 7, 2008)

Forgot to mention that we are not playing objecitves, just pitting army against army...

Objective wise I may have a chance as he will not be able to just randomly run all around the board PLUS my hard to kill PB will be more useful...


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## Wraithian (Jul 23, 2008)

Versus Eldar...

Hmm... Drop the flesh hounds. Drop the horrors. Look at taking fiends and flamers. If Fateweaver isn't cutting it for you, look at taking a keeper of secrets instead (fully kitted, or atleast with the item that gives you the hit and run ability) For your troops, plaguebearers are awesome in their ability to hang out and absorp ridiculous amounts of punishment, but I'm wondering if playing more aggressively would help in this. If so, I'd give some consideration to daemonettes. Their initiative is higher than most Eldar units, so whatever they hit is going to have a very bad day.

Soulgrinder, possibly. Take the Phlegm upgrade (str 8 pie plate), hit whatever large clusters of models you can, or engage transports in melee.

Flamers... Two small squads of those, hit the wraithlord, perhaps first one on the deepstrike, then move them into position to handle the 2nd (wounding on a 4+, disallowing any saves other than invulns), or to really mess up the dire avengers/farseer.

Fiends. Use a full squad of these (quite cheap for what they do), hit dire avengers with these, and then gang up on the banshees using these and a keeper of secrets.

Keeper of Secrets. Utilize the hit and run ability to get him/her/it into more "prime" real estate. Using the, "charge, wait until the end of your opponent's assault phase, Hit & Run, charge something else," tactic to both weaken your enemy's full strength squads (making them more managable for other squads to clean up) and to move into combat with HQ's.

I probably missed it, but how many points are you guys playing?


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## AnarchX (Apr 11, 2008)

Breath of Chaos hits anything under the template on 4+ no cover/no armor, and I believe cause a Glancing hit on vehicles. You can put that and Bolt of Tzeentch on your Daemon Prince with Mark of Tzeentch and Mastery of Sorcery to make a pretty formidable Daemon Prince that is decent at taking out armor and has decent survivability. 

Others have suggested Flamers, which I think would work good as well.

I think Bolts of Tzeentch and Breath of Chaos are your best bet. 

Screamers are good if you can actually get them in to do anything.


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## Revelations (Mar 17, 2008)

Azillith said:


> His army list is:-
> farseer x 2 Doom/Guide/SpiritStones Singnig Spear
> 20 Dire Avengers with Exarch, Bladestorm *2 Shuriken Catapault
> 3 Wave Serpent Spirit stones, Scatter Laser
> ...


This seems really low for a 1500pt Eldar list... and it's really not that specialized, but I can see how it would be a serious pain in the ass. 

First off, eliminate units that simlpy aren't going to help you. At first I was going to say anything Khorne related, but then I realized you can get a 2+ save against Psychic Stuff; pretty damn handy against Dooming Farseers. On that alone, I would consider Skulltaker or a Bloodthrister. Both are major threats to everything on the field minus the Wave Serpents, Skulltaker has the points and space initiative being a relatively cheap Herald. 

I honestly can't suggest much Slannesh outside the Keeper. Their weak in offense and defense and their cool initiatives and rending attacks really aren't going to do you much good. The same for most Khorne outside Crushers; since they have a decent amount of defenses and enough offense to harm everything outside the Serpents. 

Nurgle abosolutely shines against Eldar. Their high Toughness, FnP and invulnerability are crazy against Eldar. As far as troops go, I would suggest going half Plague Bearers and Half Nurglings. I don't really see other viable Troop units. Some may argue Horrors, but I don't see you standing up to this army on shooting grounds and their more expensive; better to use points elsewhere. Plus your Plague Bearers are yet again harmful to everything on the field; you really don't need to concern yourself with Wraithlords when everything has poison on your side. 

Other units that can help; Flamers are always nasty if they land well. Even if they don't, can still move around with relative ease. Any greater deamon works well enough.

Tactics are going to be what really saves you. I would split the majority of your troops into your first wave armed with icons. There is no way you can out manuever him, so try to land together and castle him instead. Having several solid Bearer units will gaurantee a few icons to land off of with your remaining troops. Since many of his units require short-mdeium distance, it won't be that hard for your Nurgle units to gain ground on him. 

It might be pricey, but running Kugath + Fateweaver is a very rude combination for anyone to play against; they offer a nice combination of insane resilience with nutty damage output. Pie plates, fresh nurlings on occassion, rerolls to saves and the ability to target multiple squads. Yah, these two hurt. 

I might also suggest maximizing your unit sizes. 4 groups of 5 Bearers is always nice, but have you ever seen how much it takes to completely destroy a full unit of 20 from the board? And then consider the Nurgling option? That's a sick amount of wounds to work off. 

During play, I would completely ignore the Serpents; they're too fast and have to many saves to worry about throwing anything their way. Plus all things considered, they have a small amount of shooting compared to the rest of the army. Concentrate on the stuff you can kill with ease; everything else. 

If you're still having issues, I'd be more than happy to do a few test runs with some buddies and create a Daemon army that works effectively. (We love trying things out)


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## MaidenManiac (Oct 2, 2008)

Revelations said:


> During play, I would completely ignore the Serpents; they're too fast and have to many saves to worry about throwing anything their way...


Tbh I dont think he can chose that. Atleast not turn 1, thats why including some AT in wave one comes very handy :wink:
If I was that Eldar player Id NEVER deploy the DA or howling bitches on the ground. They will start the game inside their transports, in short sitting safe turn one so they can dish out mayhem with full force...


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## cooldudeskillz (Jun 7, 2008)

horrors are your friends, they kill eldar, trust me, when i played eldar i ran a couple of horror squads and annilated his infantry, the skulltaker would eat those wraith lords, as will the bloodthirster, daemonettes would be good against eldar, som many attacks and high I. Why dont you post up a list in the daemon forums and we can help you better.


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## Azillith (Nov 7, 2008)

*LONG post*

Hi Folks,

Thank you all for your fabulous responses.... Here is a general answer to all the posts...

I know that being a noob my tactics may be all wrong, but I am being so badly beaten every time that I must be missing something BIG!!! 

1500 point army. All his troops are deployed in the Wave Serpents at the start of the game. The WS have seven Strength6 TL attacks so I cannot just ignore them as they tend to plough through my weaker troops. As the WS is a fast vehicle it can move a large distance and fire (which also means my rending units cant catch them)...PLUS with him moving each turn I have to mostly roll a 6 to even think of hitting... PLUS his troops then cause quite a huge amount of damage if their vehicle left any of my troops still standing....

HB tend to kill Nettes faster than I can hurt them becos 10 Initiative means they hit me first plus 32 attacks on the charge or 22 on the defence means that I am losing the majority of my Nettes (or anything else) each round. The PBs are an annoyance to him as they can take quite a pounding, but with the PB being slow his units just move out of range and slowly wear them down. PLUS the HB have fleet which means that if I deploy anything within striking range they have the upper hand.

And don’t forget the DA units with their Exarch and Farseers with guide and doom plus bladestorm = 32 attacks with re-rolls and re-wounds. This kills any units once off.

Even the SG don’t really cut it... Landed, attacked and inflicted 1 Wound, then when the WL retaliated he went bright lance, eml, bright lance eml (always has 2 WL next to each other)... both S8, high BS means they seldom miss – exit SG in first round. AND if my SG ever gets within 18” of the WLs -they have lance weapons so they roll TWO D6 – guaranteed pen....
If I get within range of the DAs or the HB or the WS or the WL it is almost guarantee that my units will be destroyed... BUT with CD army I have to get in close and personal...

I have tried a large number of combinations and with his army hitting about 80 times each round and having re-rolls for about a third of that he always hits hard... Maybe he is just much better at rolling than he should be??? The most success I have is bringing in the heavy hitters first wave and doing as much damage as early as possible... but I still am forced to concede by round three when I have nothing left that could take out his WS... If I miss bringing in the second wave then I am finished by end round two.

My fav army to play was:
11 Plaguebearers of Nurgle Chaos Icon
10 Bloodletters of Khorne 
10 Daemonettes of Slaanesh 
10 Pink Horrors of Tzeentch 
1 The Changeling 
4 Bloodcrushers of Khorne Chaos Icon
1 Soul Grinder of Chaos Upgrade to Phlegm
1 Bloodthisrter Blessing and Unholy Might
2 Herald of Khrone Jaggernaut, Blessing, Iron Hide

I also tried the CD Army that won the SA Nationals but that was annihilated the quickest...

Drake’s army worked much better than anything I had tried before...

So... will let you know if I ever get past round 3...

Thanks for all the advice.
Linda

PS: Pls move to the army list if this is the wrong forum...Thx


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## shadowspectre (Aug 15, 2009)

EDIT: DOH! I just saw the date on this thread now. I found the thread from google, not heresy online, apologies for digging up an old thread.



Azillith said:


> Hi Folks,
> 
> Thank you all for your fabulous responses.... Here is a general answer to all the posts...
> 
> ...


Hm... okay, well first of all theres a slight problem with this... Actually a few.
A fast vehicle that has moved more than 6" is only allowed to fire 1 weapon that has a strength higher than 4. Check the warhammer 5th edition rulebook.

Second... The wave serpent cannot HAVE 7 str 6 TL shots in 1 turn, even if it does move slowly enough to be allowed to fire all of its guns.

A wave serpent can have the following:
- 1 Twin Linked Shuriken CATAPULT (str 4) OR 1 twin linked shuriken CANNON (which has 3 str 6 shots, but is most decidedly NOT twin linked)
PLUS:
- 1 optional second weapon, which can be: TL Shuriken Cannon, TL Scatter Laser, TL Missile launcher, TL Bright lance, TL Starcannon.

I assume your opponent has equipped their wave serpent with shuriken cannon and a TL scatter laser, which amounts to 7 str 6 shots. BUT:
- The cannon is not twin linked
- The scatter laser and the cannon are not the same weapon, and both over strength 4, so if the wave serpent wants to move more than 6", it cannot fire both of them. Furthermore if it moves more than 12" it cannot fire ANYTHING.



Azillith said:


> HB tend to kill Nettes faster than I can hurt them becos 10 Initiative means they hit me first plus 32 attacks on the charge or 22 on the defence means that I am losing the majority of my Nettes (or anything else) each round. The PBs are an annoyance to him as they can take quite a pounding, but with the PB being slow his units just move out of range and slowly wear them down. PLUS the HB have fleet which means that if I deploy anything within striking range they have the upper hand.


If you're going to place your daemonettes in charging range of the howling banshees, put more than 1 unit in range. This way if he/she assaults you and anything is still alive, you can countercharge and kick their heads in.

Also.... 32 attacks on the charge? Ummm.... that means your opponent is fielding a single unit of 10 howling banshees and the exarch has mirrorswords. Which by the way, I think is a terrible idea. If you really don't have/dont want to use tougher troops than daemonettes, then try to demolish his banshee unit. Flamers come to mind obviously seeing as a squad of flamers that lands on target is almost guaranteed to kill a ridiculous amount of stuff, but even the lowly horrors have 3 shots per model and punch straight through banshee's armour saves.

So they're hiding in a wave serpent? huh, well if it moves slowly charge it and blow it up / stun it with something such as a soul grinder or screamers. If it moves quickly its not doing all that much damage.

Also, banshees cannon disembark and assault on the same turn, by the way, if thats what your opponent was doing, and daemonettes also have fleet. Therefore, if your opponent disembarks within a range which would allow his banshee's to charge on their next turn, this means your daemonettes can charge the banshees (barring terrible luck on your run roll).



Azillith said:


> And don’t forget the DA units with their Exarch and Farseers with guide and doom plus bladestorm = 32 attacks with re-rolls and re-wounds. This kills any units once off.


Except that you can DS horrors and shoot the living balls out of them on the turn your arrive and punch through their armour save. OR, you could do the battlecannon thing from the soulgrinder. Or, simply put something like plaguebearers that wont die right infront of the DAs... but you're right a re-rolling bladestorm is pretty mean.



Azillith said:


> Even the SG don’t really cut it... Landed, attacked and inflicted 1 Wound, then when the WL retaliated he went bright lance, eml, bright lance eml (always has 2 WL next to each other)... both S8, high BS means they seldom miss – exit SG in first round. AND if my SG ever gets within 18” of the WLs -they have lance weapons so they roll TWO D6 – guaranteed pen....
> If I get within range of the DAs or the HB or the WS or the WL it is almost guarantee that my units will be destroyed... BUT with CD army I have to get in close and personal...


*facedesk* Why do eldar players forget the rules conviniently. Lance weapons do not add an extra D6. Page 32 of the rulebook i think. Lance weapons treat armour higher than 12 as 12. Thats it. so a brightlance counts your soulgrinders armour as 12 instead of 13. Thats a longshot from being a MELTA weapon at half range.

and btw i'm pretty sure the firepike is the longest range melta weapon the eldar have, and its range is 18, meaning its 8+2d6 range is 9".... 

dont feel bad, i had an eldar player try to convince me that his farseer could join a unit of warwalkers once.



Azillith said:


> I have tried a large number of combinations and with his army hitting about 80 times each round and having re-rolls for about a third of that he always hits hard... Maybe he is just much better at rolling than he should be??? The most success I have is bringing in the heavy hitters first wave and doing as much damage as early as possible... but I still am forced to concede by round three when I have nothing left that could take out his WS... If I miss bringing in the second wave then I am finished by end round two.
> 
> My fav army to play was:
> 11 Plaguebearers of Nurgle Chaos Icon
> ...



Well, a large part of your problem is that the eldar player hasnt read the rulebook quite as well as he/she should have. I mean, i dont own the eldar codex and i'm pretty new to 5th edition so i might be wrong about something i said here, but feel free to look it all up.


Being a noob daemon player myself i'll let others give the tactical advice, but I will say bring some tzeench daemons. they're really really good, and barring a really nasty DS scatter, they'll kill a LOT of stuff on the first turn.


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