Imperial Guard v Nurgle. I never win

[sillyface]

Hi all,

To one general to another….

I play…I mean I battle against a friend that loves to use his damn Nurgles. I’m finding them extremely difficult to beat. The best I manage is a tie.

His tactics seem to be consistent. He uses some power that allows even his Space Marines invulnerable saves and he always deep strikes a squad of Terminators in the middle of my force which start tearing up everything.

So far my tactics are to concentrate all my firepower at the Marines as they can only capture objectives, I also try to get them at shooting phase as the Guard have no-chance at hand to hand. I never focus on the Terminators unless I use my Demolisher which is a likely risk that I would destroy my own troops (that would be humiliating) as he lands them so close. I sometimes do throw a squad at them just to slow them down for a turn but that’s about it.

I’ve now bought a squad of Lass Cannons as I plan to keep them behind the lines awaiting the eventual drop of Terminators with the benefit that there’s no-chance stray shots will hit my men.

Is this a good plan, any o

 

[Alpharius]

How to pwn nurgle marines!!

Hi,

I play both armies, IG and Plague marines. It would be a lot easier to give you advice if you could tell me your army list and your opponent\'s army list.

As it is I do not have enough information to work with and can only tell you what is usually effective vs. a plague marine army:

AP2 weapons - because they bypass FNP

Medusa cannon - indirect S10 AP2 ordenance barrage...

Inquisitor with 2 mystics vs. deepstrikers (1 mystic allows your inq. unit to detect deepstrikers within 24\" and a free shooting round with that unit at the deepstrikers before they are allowed to do anything - 2 mystics and you can designate one unit within 12\" of your Inq. unit to shoot instead; like your demolisher).

Lascannons can work, but only in large numbers and in my experience I find that tanks or artillery kill more stuff.

Drop troopers doctrine - with plasma/melta deepstriking command squads and vet. units.

Be prepared to sacrifice a few of your units, it is essential to survive the assault phase and to bait his units out of cover so you can blast them with your high S AP2 weapons.

Quote: He uses some power that allows even his Space Marines invulnerable saves

I am not sure what you mean by this, but I get the impression that he rolls an armour save, a FNP and an invulnerable save...
You only ever get 1 save! Either an armour save, a cover save or an invulnerable save.

Feel no pain is the only way to get a second chance to save a wound (if it is caused by AP3 or worse).

If he is using an invulnerable save it is either Thousand sons or regular CSM with an icon of Thzeentch, which means his unit will not have FNP and it will only be T4 instead of T5.

You have at least 5 turns to kill his troops units - fire priority is paramount! Shoot the dangerous stuff first, then move on to kill his troops.
If you allow his heavy hitters (obliterators, DP\'s, lords/sorcerors, defilers, vindicators) to go free he will decimate your army, and I think that is your problem.

Post your lists so I can give you some proper advice.

 

[sillyface]

Cheers for all that great advice. Didn’t think about Inquisitor with 2 mystics and their power of predicting where his Terminators will deep strike.
That’s the one ‘Feel no Pain’ lass guns were like pea-shooters

The 6 turn battle was for Nurgle to try and overrun my Imperial base and capture two structures.

Here’s a rough army list of our last battle. The Nurgle list isn’t accurate as it was last month and I’m not good at recognising Chaos troops yet. But what I’ve listed is pretty much what caused so much trouble

Imperial Guard
All troops had carapace armour
X2 squads (Plasma Gun, Melta Gun)
X1 command squad (Plasma Gun, Melta Gun)
Demolisher
Squad of Grey Knights
Squad of Terminators

Nurgle
All had ‘Feel no Pain’
Rhino
Defiler
X 2 squads of Marines
Squad of Terminators
Commander (sorry I can’t remember who he was)

What happened:
1. I focused my Demolisher on the Defiler as I know how nasty it is to tanks if they get to close combat.
2. I focused all Imperial troops fire power on the Rhino that contained a squad of marines.
3. I Deep Striked my Terminators behind the attacking wave to take care of the 2nd squad of marines and act as back-up to take on the Rhino if my troops failed.
4. I used the squad of Grey Knights and command squad to protect the two scoring structures.

What was the result?
1. His Defiler got into close combat with the Demolisher and knocked out the guns but then the Demolisher rammed and destroyed it.
2. One squad of troops (Melta Gun) immobilized the Rhino but they themselves destroyed by the disembarking Marines during hand to hand. The second squad swept round to help out but themselves were destroyed hand to hand. They were amazing as they held them back for a good couple of turns.
3. My Terminators destroyed his second squad of marines but we too far away to help where the rest of the action was. Instead the only target available was to destroy the Rhino.
4. The Grey Knights were glorious at holding back the Nurgle Terminators but were destroyed by the last turn and gave a clear path for the disembarked Marines to take the first structure. My command squad was in the second structure but as they’re not classed as not being able to capture objectives the day was Nurgles.

Any ideas?


???

 

[Alpharius]

How to pwn nurgle marines part II

Ooo-kay, now that I have a better idea of what is going on it is easier to see what went wrong.

The units your army list consists of seems okay to me - but the details of the units are where you can improve your army\'s performance (upgrades for instance).

First, the nurgle guys:

If ALL his marines had FNP, which means that they are actual plague marines - then he CANNOT have an invulnerable save. Period.
The terminators: they can ONLY improve their T to 5 by taking an icon of nurgle - but that icon will not give them access to the FNP rule.
The commander: same as with the terminators, the commander can only improve his T, he won\' get FNP by taking a mark of nurgle.

I think that you have identified the right fire priority targets, of course a lot depends on terrain and deployment but I would concentrate my fire on his units in this order:

Rhino
Defiler
Marines
Commander
Terminators

I want the rhino dead, or in-operable first thing, as usually marine players go 12\" towards you on turn 1, disembark 2\" towards you measured from the now sideways parked rhino (which is conveniently creating a wall for his other troops) - and then they rapid fire and splatter an entire guard unit all over the place... that sux.
I can imagine that his lord was in the rhino too? Or was it a deepstriking termie-lord? If he was in the rhino you have even more reason to shoot it first thing.

You don\'t neccessarily have to destroy it, if you get an immobilised result, or stun it (and he doesn\'t have extra armour or the possessed upgrade!) - move on to another target.

It is a good thing that you know how dangerous the defiler can be, but don\'t try to kill it with your demolisher... back on that later.

Next priority depends on what is most threatening to you right now; are the termies here yet? No? Then kill as many plague marines as possible - usually they will be more dangerous and kill more than the terminators - but people have a tendency to think that the terminators are the most threatening unit and pour an excessive amount of in-effective fire at them which they will just absorb.
The reason a unit of plague marines usually kills more of your army is that such a unit is usually larger than a termie unit.

Depeding on what configuration his commander is, this guy can move way up the priority list - if it\'s a fly/jump pack lord you have to kill him as he will slaughter a guard unit every turn. If it\'s a DP you HAVE to kill it asap!


Your army:

I will try not to change your army too much, but I really feel that you should get rid of either the terminators or the regular grey knights. I suggest that you ditch the regular GK\'s.
They are very effective but they take up too many points of your main army.
A guard army with GK termies is an effective combo. You don\'t need additional GK\'s.

Furthermore, I would get rid of the carapace doctrine as you have to give it to ALL your infantry and that\'s 20 points per squad*3 (as you have 3 guard inf units) = 60 points, ask yourself: what can I get for 60 points? Answer: MORE special weapons, when you play guard there can be NO half-measures.

Oh, I just noticed that your army is illegal...

You have to fulfill the FOC from your \"parent\" army list, which is guard - so you have to include a guard troops choice more. It looks like you just took a basic platoon, but the platoon com. sqd is not an HQ choice.

The regular GK\'s do not count as a compulsory FOC choice.

Is it 1000 point armies you\'ve got?

Is FW stuff allowed?

Try the drop troops doctrine - a 5 man vet. unit with 3 melta-guns should kill the defiler if you deepstrike them close enough (be bold with deepstrikes, it scares your opponent! Even if you lose the sqd. to a deepstrike mishap, just shrug and say I\'ve got more - psychological warfare IS a part of this game you know ).

You can also try the light infantry doctrine, which allows you to set up your infantry after he has deployed - and you don\'t even have to give it to everybody in your army unlike carapace armour.

Get your command squads 4 identical special weapons, I am biased towards 4 flamers or 4 melta-guns - but plasma is also pretty good unless you roll a lot of ones...
I use FW stuff, and have 3 centaurs (fast open-topped vehicles with room for 5 guys), which allow me to easily reach a perfect spot for flaming infantry, 4 flamers deal a LOT of wounds, which will often kill special weapons, aspiring champ\'s and icons because of how wound allocation works.
I go with 2 com. sqds - one is my HQ, the other is my platoon com. - both units have 4 flamers each.
The last centaur has 5 storm troopers with 2 plasma- or meltaguns.

It works almost as well by deepstriking these units or by disembarking them from a chimera (though that is a more risky than staying inside a centaur).

As I said it the first post, plague marines HATE AP2 weapons, your best AP2 weapon is a large template from your demolisher: use it to kill plague marines! It is equipped with 2 plasma cannon sponsons and a hull lascannon, right?

You mentioned that you have bought 3 lascannon teams, try infiltrating them (with light inf doctrine) so they get a perfect line of fire to either the defiler or the rhino.

Hope I gave you some ideas here, make a new (legal) army list and post it here.


Good luck

 

[Dragonsreach]

Originally posted by sillyface

His tactics seem to be consistent.
Or is he locked into a methodology, becoming inflexible and predictable?

He uses some power that allows even his Space Marines invulnerable saves? Check this out with the Chaos codex (borrow your stores copy if needed and ask advise)and he always deep strikes a squad of Terminators in the middle of my force which start tearing up everything.

OK just reading this is making me curious.
When you say he Always Deep Strikes is he using the rules correctly or is he \"fudging\" them to his advantage.
Remember Deep Strike-ing Troops have to role as reserves to arrive.
They also have to role to see if they land where expected or up to 2D6 from the intended point. (page 95 in the 40K rule book){I was that curious I had to go look it up lol}.

So is he really THAT lucky every time?

 

[Undave]

He doesn\'t have to roll for deepstrike scatter if he lands his troops within 6\" of a model with an icon as they act like teleport homers. It\'s very important for you to make him allocate saves round the squad, you may get lucky and kill the icon bearer.

As for the rest, you seem to be trying to play both sides of the field with your army. It\'s neither a full IG army, nor is it an Inquisitorial force. If all your troops have carapace armour anyway why not just make them full Stormtroopers from the Daemonhunters book? Generally it won\'t help you too much against Plague Marines but the extra pip in BS will at least make your shooting slightly better. This option would also allow you two important changes to your list; first is the ability to take two special weapons per squad, fill up on plasma guns and rapid fire as much as you can. The second thing is that it will allow you to field your Grey Knights as troops meaning that they can capture objectives.

One of the worst things about Nurgle armies is the fact that all their plague marines count as troops and can therefore capture objectives. The fact that they are so hard to kill means that they can normally just amble over to an objective marker and sit there taking all the fire directed at them. His biggest mistake is not taking enough of them. Kill his two PM squads and he can\'t hold anything only contest.

Your other option is to drop the Inquisitorial stuff and go for an all Guard army. To do this would require a major re-structuring of your list though. Drop the armour, it\'s pointless. Sure it\'ll give you a save against bolters but having twice the number of Guardsmen to soak up casualties is a much better idea. Max out on heavy weapons and use their long range to pummel the PM squads before they can get anywhere near you. Missile launcher teams are good for this as a couple of well placed salvoes of krak missiles can decimate a PM squad. To this end a support weapon platoon or two is a good investment, added to your demolsher they can toast the Rhino and the demolisher in short order and then turn their fire on the slower Marines. If he\'s popping out termies in the middle of your lines try having a dedicated melee unit standing by to counter charge. Being charged with rough rider hunting lances can really spoil a terminators day. Don\'t forget that he can\'t sweep directly from one combat to another. meaning that he can only kill one squad a turn. If he ends up killing them outright he\'ll be left standing there like a lemon allowing you to pour all your spare firepower into them. Don\'t forget these guys are quite a way down your target priority list though so only shoot them with squads that can\'t target the Marines. Once you\'ve had a go at shooting them up a bit. Charge them with a couple of cheap infantry squads to pin him in place. The terminators will probably only turn up in turn 3 or more, any earlier and they won\'t be close enough to come off an icon and will scatter. This means that on average they will only have 4 turns of combat in a 6 turn game. You can use this to your advantage by only allowing him to kill 4 squads of guardsmen. This will net him about 300 points worth of kills from a unit that is worth considerably more, if you sacrifice the right units to them they won\'t stand a chance of making their points back and will be a colossal waste for your opponent.

The new Imperial Guard Codex is out in a month or two so you may find something in there that you can use to your advantage. Ogryns sound like they\'re going to be a bit tougher, they may be usefull for playing the Plague Marines at their own game. Ratlings too could turn out to be quite useful.

From the list you gave your opponent only has five units, two which can hold objectives and three which can only contest them. If you play it right you can make it so he can\'t hold anything and not have enough units left in the right place to contest the ones you\'ve got, allowing you to win purely on objectives. My best advice is not to get hung up on how much he\'s killing, remember your mission objectives and hope to the dice gods that you don\'t have to play anihilation lol

 

[sillyface]

He’s pretty up on his Codex. I doubled checked with GW staff.

Icon! That’s it!! The thing he uses to Deep Strike. Yeah, also it’s Feel no Pain that he uses for the PM. I got very confused between that and Invulnerable saves when I first battled against them. But I’m smarter now.


WoW Alpharius and Undave. That’s a fantastic refreshing perspective. Surprised about the carapace armour but I totally agree with not including a squad of Grey Knights. It does now feel like that I’ve organised my force in half measures. I think I need to be a bit more bold and brave and do like you’ve suggested and ditch the Carapace Armour and focus on numbers and firepower. I’ll have a good sit down this week and work out a new revamped army list. I have a collection of 2000 points to choose from ranging from 2 Basiliks to 3 Chimeras. But I’ll aim for around 1500 points as our battle tends to be around that number. I’ll post it up for you to check. Cheers. Perhaps I might make two. One for defending and another for attacking which is my usual practise. Oh and yes we can also use FW stuff.

That’s right, his lord has a jump pack and has a number of wounds to get through before he dies. He often uses this little guy to plant a bomb on the rear of my tanks. He’s not been much of a problem as I often knock him before he gets too close.

I agree Undave. I’ve focused fire power on the few units that can score such as the PM which is how the games often end up in a tie. This has happened in that by the time I kill all of the scoring units his Terminators kill my scoring units. But I think the points I’ll save on not having Carapace Armour to buy more troops will help tie up his terminators in that aspect.

Alpharius, I like the idea of Deep Striking a veteran squad with Melta Guns. He was off balance when I Deep Striked my Terminators so it would be good to get some Imperial Guard out there and getting dirty rather than waiting for the oncoming attack. I feel I’ve watched the film Zulu too much lol

You say the Ogryns are going to be more tougher in the new Codex. Does anyone know any other nice little changes in the next addition?

Oh dear...My force has been illigal
So I need to include another command squad is that right?

 

[Show Case Studio]

have you thourght about using assains, these little guys can do a lot of damage and there is 1 that could take the defiler on her own and still have time to take in the sights lol, i always use 1 nd they have not let me down yet,

 

[Alpharius]

How to pwn nurgle marines part III

I agree with Undave, as you can probably see from my other posts - but do not take missile launchers!!

Reason: a krak missile is S8 AP3, and AP3 does not deny a plague marine his FNP save.

I forgot to mention that power weapons/fists/rending also denies FNP - obviously in close combat, which you don\'t want your guard to participate in.
Your GK termies on the other hand will love to get into close combat with his plague marines!

Try centaurs, medusas, deepstriking vet\'s and com. sqds (HQ and platoon com sqds) with 4 spec. weapons. Put the command sqds in centaurs and go on the offensive!!
Instead of GK termies I use a death watch unit with a librarian (if you have access to army builder or the rules from a WD you can use this unit).

As Undave said, you have to get rid of the icon! That\'s why I put that rhino in the top of the fire priority list, as you can be pretty sure that unit has an icon, his lord will probably have a personal icon too as insurance - but he can be instant killed with the demolisher, if he has T5 because of mark of nurgle, otherwise he should feel pretty uncomfortable when you point 3 lascannons at him...

Regarding the new dex, you can read all about the rumours here:

http://warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=185873

Enjoy



Edit:

Do NOT try to kill a defiler with an assassin!

Assassins have S4, a defiler is a walker - you only hit walkers on their front AV12.

 

[Undave]

Originally posted by Alpharius
I agree with Undave, as you can probably see from my other posts - but do not take missile launchers!!

Reason: a krak missile is S8 AP3, and AP3 does not deny a plague marine his FNP save.

It isn\'t the ap3 bit that does it. Don\'t forget that the mark of Nurgle still counts the models base tougness for instant death purposes. In this case the PM\'s unmodified toughness is 4 meaning that a S8 weapon will cause instant death negating his feel no pain save.

 

[Alpharius]

GAH!!

You are absolutely right - for some reason I made a brainfart and thought Plague Marines had T5 instead of T4(5) - someone shoot me!

Also note, that when a weapon causes instant death it ignores the Eternal Warrior rule too.

Now, let\'s see a revised army list!

 

[Roger Bunting]

Originally posted by Alpharius
GAH!!

You are absolutely right - for some reason I made a brainfart and thought Plague Marines had T5 instead of T4(5) - someone shoot me!

Also note, that when a weapon causes instant death it ignores the Eternal Warrior rule too.

Now, let\'s see a revised army list!

You seem to have got that the wrong way around. Eternal Warrior ignores Instant Death.

 

[Alpharius]

Yeah?

Shoot me twice!! You are right, I don\'t even know how I could believe what I wrote...

 

[sillyface]

Hi,
From reading all your great advice, I’ve drawn up a defensive Imperial Guard army list.
I would be grateful if you could take a look and see if this will be a formidable army against Chaos scum as well as being legal ;-)

All units are using the Light Infantry doctrine except for the elites.

HQ
Senior Officer
x2 Grenade Launchers
Melta Gub
Medic

Command Squad
Junior Officer
Power fist
x2 Flamer
x2 Grenade Launcher

Infantry

Squad A
x10 Guardsmen
Flamer
Squad B
x10 Guardsmen
Melta Gun
Squad C
x10 Guardsmen
Grenade Launcher
Squad D
x10 Guardsmen
Flamer

Hardened Veterans
Veteran Sergeant
Plasma Pistol
x3 Melta Gun

Storm Troopers
Veteran Sergeant
Flamer
Grenade Launcher
Infiltration

Grey Knight Terminator
X4 Terminators
Incinerator
Brother Captain

Lass Cannon Platoon

Demolisher
Lass Cannon
Plasma Cannon Sponsons
Pintal Mounted Bolter

Total
1491 points

 

[Alpharius]

Nurgle will pwn you!

I\'ll take the perspective of the Chaos guy here:

Your demolisher is the single most threatening thing in your army but it\'s rather alone - guess what I will kill first? What will you do when it dies?

Next target is the hardened veterans then the GK\'s, not a problem after the demolisher is dead - that will probably take a maximum of one turn...

The rest of your army does not scare me at all.

To kill your GK\'s I would tarpit them with a large lesser daemon unit, likewise with your hardened veterans - if I can\'t just shoot them (vets die easily).


Btw, your army is still not legal. A platoon consists of 1 platoon command squad (junior officer) and 2-5 squads with an option to take a remnant squad of 5-9 guardsmen.

After you have got a platoon you get access to another 2 kinds of troop choice, which you can get 1 of each of for each platoon: 1 armoured fist squad and/or 1 conscript platoon (depending on doctrines...).

Try this with your Command squad: SO with power fist + 4 flamers (my fav. - but many people prefer 4 plasma or meltaguns - I suggest you give them a chimera).

Try this with your Platoon com. sqd.: either 4 flamers, meltaguns or plasma. Again I would give them a chimera.

Your regular squads are okay - but grenade launchers are way too expensive for what they do and they won\'t make a difference vs. plague marines! Upgrade to plasma guns or meltaguns.

Your lascannon platoon (3 teams right?) are okay, but they´die easily and won\'t kill much.


If you want a defensive guard army - try basilisks and demolishers with plasma cannons - use basic guardsmen squads to bait enemy units into cc. After they slaughter your unit and stand in the middle of nowhere you can blast them with the rest of your army.

You need AP1 and AP2 weapons - much more than you have got - otherwise you won\'t bypass FNP. Besides he probably has a big gribbly or 2 in his army.

 

[Undave]

Originally posted by Alpharius

Your demolisher is the single most threatening thing in your army but it\'s rather alone - guess what I will kill first? What will you do when it dies?

I\'d probably spend a few minutes laughing at my opponent for spending all that effort killing it when there are plenty more threatening targets in the army.

If you were up against a generic Chaos army with a bit of a mix of troop types then I\'d probably support what Alpharius is saying, but we\'re not playing one of them are we? The big thing about Plaguemarines is that the lack pretty much any long range anti-tank firepower. If he\'s sets up any havoc squads you can pummel them with whatever you want safe in the knowledge that they have nowhere near the resilience of true Plaguemarines. The Defiler just doesn\'t have the clout to take down a Demolisher unless your opponent is very lucky and gets a direct hit with the battle cannon. The only other thing you need to worry about for the first couple of turns are PM squads equipped with Meltaguns and most of them will be too far away to do any damage until at least turn 2. The ones in the Rhino may be a problem if they have a melta but again you can pop a squad in front of the Demolisher and give it a handy 50/50 save against destruction. When the Terminators actually turn up (they won\'t be able to charge it until turn 3) hopefully you\'ll have more than made your points up and won\'t feel too bad about losing it.

Your army is legal, you just have to drop in one of the other doctrines that changes one of your elites to a troops choice and you\'re sorted.

Much as I like them, flamers are a bit useless against PMs. granted you can hit quite a few of them but you\'ll be wounding on 5\'s and you\'ll have to get very close to do it. I\'d stick to either grenade launchers or preferably plasmas. S6 krak grenades or a rapid fire burst from a plasma gun can really ruin a PMs day.

The Lascannon team is not something I would use personally but you\'re pretty much guaranteed to pop both the Defiler and the Rhino (the latter being the priority target), you can then use it to pick off PMs at a distance. Sure you\'ll only kill one or two a turn but they\'re casualties he can\'t afford to lose.

My biggest piece of advice is to drop the light infantry doctrine and buy more shooty things with the points you save. You\'ve put this together as a defensive army, so do just that. Sit there, dig in and wait for him to shamble towards you whilst shooting everything you\'ve got at him. Infiltrating might allow you to position your units slightly better but in the end, is it worth the sacrifice? Before you and your opponent set up your armies try to work out where you would put all your infiltrators if they weren\'t infiltrating and then when you come to deploy them, if they\'re in about the same place you\'ll know whether it was worth it or not.

All of this may be fairly accademic soon as the new Codex looks set to shake up the way Guard armies fight. Some of the new tank options sound like just the thing you\'ll need to clean up against a Nurgle army.

 

[Alpharius]

It\'s not likely his frind\'s entire army is made up of plague marines.

Most CSM armies include obliterators - I have yet to see one without them (except my own as I think obliterators are so ugly I would never paint them).

Obliterators kill tanks. Defilers kill tanks. Daemon princes kill tanks. Vindicators... well you get it.

Most CSM armies, wether they claim to be \"nurgle\", or whatever else, include one or more of these units - so plenty of things to kill that very lone demolisher (it is his only vehicle, you know).
Then I haven\'t even taken into account that CSM or plague marines with meltaguns in rhinos also kill tanks.

Have you ever played a CSM army? The defiler won\'t shoot it\'s battle cannon at the demolisher, it has the fleet rule and probably 2 extra dreadnought cc weapons. It\'s fast. It will use terrain and rhinos as cover and when it gets there it will easily shred a demolisher, or another heavy hitter unit will, which he can\'t kill because he has too few anti-tank/low AP weapons.

3 lascannons are not going to do much, I\'ve fielded them many times both with and without sharpshooters - and they\'re performance is almost \"okay\" but they never really seem to excel.

A S6 grenade launcher shot is not exactly going to kill lots of plague marines... 0.5 (to hit)*0.66 (to wound)*0.33 (failed armour save)*0.5 (FNP) = 0.05% chance to kill a plague marines for an 8 point weapon??

Plasma gun: 0.5*5/6 = 0.42% chance to kill a plague marine for only 2 points more - and it can get another shot within 12\", which kills 0.84 plague marines.

With overheat included it would be 0.31 dead plague marines for single shot, or 0.62 dead plague marines for 2 shots - still way better than a single S6 grenade.


Where are there plenty of dangerous targets after the demolisher is killed?? Yea sure, the lascannons have to die - but it\'s not that difficult to nail 6 T3 guys.

GK terminators depending on how lucky they get when they deepstrike - and they can\'t assault when they land, besides storm bolters are not going to kill a lot of plague marines.

Then there\'s the vets, they are dangerous - but like most of the rest of the army they only have short ranged weapons.
Sorry to say it, but you don\'t play a defensive guard army with short ranged weapons.


His list is not legal. It can be made legal with a change of doctrines as you suggest or by taking another \"normal\" troop choice - but to say it is legal with a change doesn\'t make it legal before he has decided how to change it.

I know flamers suck on paper. I also know that my entire group of 40k players (a pretty competitive bunch!) hate my 4*flamer units more than my medusas, infernus round heavy mortars or demolishers.
Of course you don\'t believe me, I know I was very sceptical myself, but the extreme number of wounds they deal ensures that (baring insane die-rolls) that something dies - and that something more often than not includes a special weapon, sergeant, icon or similar juicy stuff.
I still suggest plasma/melta vs. a nurgle army - but you never know if your friend suddenly includes a nice shielding unit or two of relatively cheap lesser daemons...

First time I tried 4 flamers I got lucky - I disembarked my command squad from a chimera: aimed at a unit of plague marines (the chimera blew off a weapon on their rhino, penetrating hit so they had to disembark as it was 4th edit.) - but a regular unit of CSM were in between... I killed 5 regulars and 4 plague marines and immobilized the rhino.

Yes I was stupidly lucky - but even if it were 4 plasma guns I couldn\'t have killed that much.

If you want to be sure to kill a dangerous unit you have to use at least 2 guard units. You can\'t depend on one unit (like the 3 lascannons) to do it, like it was a SM devastator squad.

In short your army lacks synergy.

Light infantry is a very good doctrine as you don\'t have to give it to everybody, it makes it easier to move through difficult terrain and you can deploy outside of the normal deployment zone, which can be very important.

I suggest that you give 2 of your inf squads missile launchers and the other 2 squads autocannons.
Now I would get a little anxious if I were facing 2 missile launchers, 2 autocannons, 3 lascannons and the demolisher.

 

[Undave]

Yes I have played CSM, both controlling and opposing. I have about 3k of pure Deathguard. I also have a 2k Noisemarine army and the same in generic CSMs. I\'m mainly a Guard player though, so far I have 8 IG armies on the go ranging from the fledgeling to the unfeasibly massive. Owning all these miniature doesn\'t automatically make me an expert in how to use them but I\'d like to think that I\'ve been playing long enough to know what I\'m talking about.

Sillyface\'s army, bar a few tweaks like upping the firepower a bit, ought to be more than capable of dealing with the troops selection he described in his earlier post.

Nurgle
All had ‘Feel no Pain’
Rhino
Defiler
X 2 squads of Marines
Squad of Terminators
Commander (sorry I can’t remember who he was)

If his opponent does start fielding other units like Obliterators etc. then yes he probably will need to change his army a bit, but that\'s not what he was asking advice on. The force he\'s come up with should be quite capable of defeating his opponents Plaguemarine army, it won\'t do it every time but if the game was a foregone conclusion why bother playing it in the first place?

I\'m not going to turn this thread into a slanging match, that\'s hardly going to help Sillyface win any of his games. There has been a lot of good advice given in this thread, from both parties. I hope some of it allows Sillyface to better his game.

From a cursory glance through the new Guard Codex you may want to hold off on making any big decisions until you\'ve got hold of it yourself. There are quite a few new options available to the guard player. I\'d certainly recommend investing in a squadron of plasma cannon armed sentinels :twisted:

 

[Alpharius]

The first lists he asked about looks like it\'s 1000 points each (unless he forgot to mention something...) - the revised list is a 1500 points list.

So if they upped the points by 500, there\'s bound to be something else in the CSM army too.

I completely agree with Undave about holding off any big decisions as the release date of the new \'dex is now only a little more than a month away.

Countdown to 2. May :twisted:

 

[jerry kurl]

I play a vannilla marine list and the last game I played against nurgle I quite literally had my ass handed to me! we were playing a 3000pt game and i had vanguard, sternguard, terminators, assualt terminators, assualt marines, vindicators, crusader, preadator and a several normal troops, also using vulkan hestan (or charlten as hes known in my army! ) i went very heavy on the combi meltas and meltas where ever i could get them in knowing that they would negate that damn feel no pain rule, he was fielding vindicators, a defiler (my god that thing is big!) plague marines, and i think tzeentch marked marines (noise marines or some such) and two DPs he had everything in he could fit in rhinos and basically they never left the vehicles! his DPs wernt much use against the assualt terminators (storm shields are a must and deep strike them) i couldnt get enough troops into place to drop his vehicles with meltas and those that did get close enough had there dice cursed by nurgle and i rolled a huge amount of ones! even on the damn rerolls! One of the things that hammered me was the huge amount of template weapons they could fire at me (namley the launchers on ALL of the vehicles!) he used his heavy armour and vehicles to whittle my troops down way to much before i could get anyone into effective range and those few i did manage to get into range all got eaten, vomited on or blown apart before they could effect any damage themselves. I know this isint much help to you but im just helping to state that nurgle when used correctly is bloody lethal and very difficult to combat (even by vannila marine lists!) oh and sling a squad of turbo boosting bikes armed with meltas into the mix and you know your armour is screwed! All i would say is wait for the new codex (there will be some great new toys in there) and invest into rapid firing plasma canons leman russ variants :twisted: - the coedex as it stands is alittle out gunned by everything including smurfs and very small bunny rabbits the new codex will see much better equipment including hell guns (rapid firing higher strength? lasguns) and as afinal note all i can say is COVER COVER COVER where ever possible use the best cover you can find its now hugly important in 5th ed much more than in previous versions.

At the end of the day it was Imperial Guard Generals that found the term Meat Grinder in a dictionary and made good use of it - IG arnt meant to live for the emperor there meant to die! - UP AND AT EM OVER THE TOP AND HAVE AT EM YOU CADS- FIX BAYONETS!!! CHARGE!!!!!