Richard and I got a playtest game in yesterday, trying out assorted changes in these two lists.


DEATH GUARD LIST

062 Daemon-heavy, 3000 POINTS
Death Guard (NetEA V0.6.2)
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PLAGUE MARINE RETINUE [465]
7 Plague Marines, Death Guard Daemon Prince, 3 (Beasts) Chaos Spawn, Daemonic Pact (includes 1 Lesser Daemon)

BLIGHTLORD TERMINATORS [480]
4 Blightlord Terminators, Plaguecaster Lord, Nurgle's Rotters, Teleportarium, Daemonic Pact (includes 1 Lesser Daemon), Nurgling Infestation (1+1D3 Nurgling Swarms)

PLAGUE MARINE RETINUE [415]
7 Plague Marines, Lord of Contagion (Supreme Commander), Daemonic Pact (includes 1 Lesser Daemon), 4 Death Guard Rhino

CONTAGION TOWERS* [400]
4 Contagion Towers, (Walkers) Desecrator

DEATH GUARD CHOSEN [290]
4 Plague Marine Chosen, Daemonic Pact (includes 1 Lesser Daemon), 3 (Beasts) Beasts of Nurgle

PLAGUE ZOMBIE INFESTATION* [175]
3+2D6 Plague Zombies

PLAGUE ZOMBIE INFESTATION* [175]
3+2D6 Plague Zombies

DAEMON POOL [75]
5 Lesser Daemon (Plaguebearers)

ARMOURED ASSAULT COMPANY [250]
6 Death Guard Vindicators

FESTER TITAN [275]


DARK ANGELS LIST

Incompertus, 3000 POINTS
Dark Angels (NetEA Dark Angels v1.95 TCMD forum)
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LAND RAIDERS [250]
3 Land Raiders

DEATHWING TERMINATORS [400]
4 Deathwing Terminators, Interrogator Chaplain

DEATHWING TERMINATORS [350]
4 Deathwing Terminators

DEATHWING DREADNOUGHTS [300]
5 Deathwing Dreadnoughts plus Transport

RAVENWING SUPPORT [250]
5 Ravenwing Land Speeder Venegance

RAVENWING ATTACK [450]
1x Ravenwing Black Knights, 3x Ravenwing Land Speeder, 4 Ravenwing Assault Bikes, Grand Master

RAVENWING NEPHILIM [225]
2 Ravenwing Nephilim Interceptors

RAVENWING DARK TALON [225]
2 Ravenwing Dark Talons

STRIKE CRUISER [200]
Strike Cruiser

DEVASTATORS [350]
4 Dark Angels Devastators plus Transport, 2 Dark Angels Stalkers



DEPLOYMENT

DG-half objectives in green, DA in white:





We were treating the parkland as -1 to hit for being in cover, but no other effect.
The roads were roads.
Grean areas were woodland, treated as abstract area terrain.
Individual buildings blocked LoF as-is to units behind them, and were area terrain internally.
The grey rectangle was buildings for movement, with LoF blocked as-is.

The DA Spacecraft was due to arrive in turn one.

Two Ravenwing formations garrisoned, facing off against my Prince's Retinue and the Chosen.


TURN ONE

DA win strategy.
DG bring in one Zombie formation to cover the left flank of the Prince's Retinue from teleporters etc.

DA Spacecraft arrives, and the barrage breaks the Contagions.
> Deathwing Dreads land via Drop Pod, placing BMs on the Vindicators, Fester and Zombies, but no kills!
> White Deathwing with Chaplain land on my left flank, while the Black Deathwing arrive on my right flank, off the appropriate Ravenwing formations.
DA RETAIN to COORDINATED ASSAULT with the Black DW and the Grand Master's Ravenwing, breaking the Chosen (and killing off the Beasts of Nurgle via hackdowns).

DG Armoured Assault Company SUSTAIN into the DW Dreads for a kill, but use the SC re-roll to activate.
DG RETAIN with the Fester Titan, to SUSTAIN into the DW Dreads, killing another 2 and breaking them with massed Disrupt hits.

DA Dark Talons arrive and attack the SC's Retinue, with a Rhino full of Plague Marines dying to a MW hit.
DA RETAIN with the Nephilim onto the Prince's formation, to little effect.

DG Prince's Retinue ENGAGE the Ravenwing Vengeances on Overwatch but lose. Not having used Daemons for ages, I forgot to summon before activating the formation! Nurgle's Rot claims 1 downed Speeder, taking the Daemon Pool up to 10. Remaining Ravenwing consolidate into a supporting position for...

DA Land Raiders ENGAGE the Zombies, killing two and winning the assault.

DG SC's Retinue summon 1 Plaguebearer into the empty transport slot in a Rhino, and ENGAGE the Black DW with Firefight. Both sides kill 1 unit, DG win but get no Plaguebearers from Nurgle's Rot.

DA White DW ADVANCE and kill a Zombie.


TURN ONE ENDPHASE & NOTES
3 DG formations had been broken before they could activate.
Broken Prince's Retinue rally, with 3BM.
Broken Zombies fail, and reposition to be irritating.
Broken Black DW rally with 2BM.
Broken DW Dreads fail with SC re-roll and reposition into the scrubland.
Unbroken SC's Retinue fail to rally, and keep their 4BMs.
Broken Chosen fail to rally, and move further left.
Broken Contagions (2 Contagions + 1 Desecrator remaining) rally with 1BM.

_________________
The Wargaming Trader
NetEA Death Guard Army Champion

P.S. DA Devastators went into Overwatch at some point, in preparation for teleporters.

TURN TWO

DG bring in the Blightlord Terminators on the right flank near the Black DW, along with the second Zombie formation.
DG win strategy (woo!).

DG fresh Zombies ENGAGE the Black DW with supporting fire from 3 Blightlords in range. 1 kill each, Zombies lose.
DG RETAIN with Blightlords into the Black DW. 1 kill each, Blightlords lose combat and fall back towards the DA blitz, last stand of Black DW breaks.

DA Dark Talons shoot the SC's Retinue, killing 2 Rhinos and breaking the formation due to them no rallying in the endphase.
DA Nephilim RETAIN into the Contagions for no kills.

DG Fester DOUBLEs up the left flank into the White DW, killing 2 and breaking them.
DG RETAIN with AAC Vindicators to DOUBLE towards the middle of the table, killing 2 Bikes from the GM's Ravenwing but not breaking them.

DA GM's Ravenwing ENGAGE the last Chosen, and consolidate to put the SC's Retinue in their scout ZoC.
DA RETAIN with the Vengeances, to DOUBLE and break the Contagions (no kills).

DG Prince's Retinue summon 5 Plaguebearers and MARSHAL, advancing forwards and removing all BMs.

DA Devastators DOUBLE to crossfire the AAC Vindicators, I think for no kills.


TURN TWO ENDPHASE

Blightlords & SC's Retinue rally. Contagions fail and fall back from the Vengeances.
White DW rally, DW Dreads fail.

_________________
The Wargaming Trader
NetEA Death Guard Army Champion

TURN THREE

DA win strategy roll.

DA Devastators SUSTAIN into the AAC, killing four Vindicators due to crossfire.
DA GM's Ravenwing RETAIN to ENGAGE the SC's Retinue, Retinue loses.

DG Fester ADVANCEs and breaks the White DW again, I think killing one as well.
DG Prince's Retinue RETAINs, summoning 3 Plaguebearers and ENGAGEs the Devastators, mainly for satisfaction rather than being tactically useful. 4 Devs die and 3 turn into Plaguebearers, Devs lose.

DA Dark Talons kill two Blightlord Terminators (the third only survived because of the 5+ INV), and the remaining Nurgling. Blightlord lord breaks.

DG newer Zombies MARSHAL and surround an objective.

DA Nephilim kill 1 of the 2 remaining Vindicators.

DA Land Raiders ADVANCE back to the DA Blitz and fail to kill the Blightlord (last stand from the BTS).


TURN THREE ENDPHASE

Blightlord rallies. White and Black DW rally.

DA Ravenwing Vengeances have my Blitz and GM's Ravenwing hold my right flank objective, so the game ends 2-0 to the DA.

_________________
The Wargaming Trader
NetEA Death Guard Army Champion

My Death Guard thoughts:

Nurgle's Rot - three formations had Nurgle's Rot, due to the Lord of Contagion Supreme Commander, Daemon Prince and the 40pt upgrade to give it to the Blightlords. Over the game, above-average rolling gained 6-7 points into the Daemon Pool. Given the investment in the Blightlord's upgrade and the slightly reduced damage output of the Lord of Contagion and Daemon Prince, and 175pt allocated to Daemonic Pacts and the Daemon Pool, this didn't feel overpowered - but the list could probably start with fewer lesser Daemons and still make use of it. The upgrade might drop to 35pt.

Blightlords - did OK but not stunningly good, but that was due to poor combat-res rolls, followed by poor saves against the Dark Talons' attacks.

Beasts of Nurgle - with 4+ Reinforced Armour they did a good job of soaking hits for the Chosen, before galumphing off back to the Warp (not being Fearless, they all died to hackdown hits when beaten).


My Dark Angel thoughts:

Coordinated Teleport - having the Terminators teleport in with the Spaceship activation felt very thematic. I can see potential for abuse in a DW-have force, but the requirement for the whole formation to be in ZoC of a Teleport Homer unit should be balancing enough.

Dark Talons - ooooooh my. OK, as a Death Guard player I'm particularly biased against MW attacks coming out of nowhere, but MW3+ on an aircraft is... painful. Admittedly that was partly due to inadequate AA in my list, but Marines don't generally have issues shutting down AA.

Ravenwing Support Vengeances - currently these are far too big an upgrade for only 10pt a model. 50% better AP and 200% better AT and increased FF is way too much compared to Tornados for the same price, and this is exacerbated by Scout meaning that they can Garrison and therefore be in Overwatch. Basically, there is no better 50pt you can spend anywhere in the list.

Ravenwing Attack - a pretty beefy formation for Marines, with 8 units. I liked these both for theme and effectiveness.

_________________
The Wargaming Trader
NetEA Death Guard Army Champion

Death Guard 0.6.2: viewtopic.php?f=82&t=32848
Dark Angels 1.95: viewtopic.php?f=73&t=32991

_________________
The Wargaming Trader
NetEA Death Guard Army Champion

Richard's feedback:

The first game I was testing out a new rule for DA called co-ordinated teleport, it allows teleport units to come down in the same activation as planetfall troops from a spaceship so long as they come down within 15cms of a teleport homer. (Dark angels have quite a few of those...) This proved a powerful combination as they come down with greatly reduced chances of blast markers due to the teleport homers, nearby friendly who can support them and after the opponent has been barraged from space and drop pods. The result was pretty effective, I was lucky with the barrage, breaking Ian's lone AA unit and his artillery, the drop pods put blasts onto 3 formations and I retained to have terminators and Ravenwing engage and nearly wipe out a formation of chosen with beasts of nurgle. It didn't all go the Dark angels way as the dreadnoughts got pummelled by vindicators and then a plague hound before breaking and failing to rally twice and that plague hound also neatly killed half the deathwing with chaplain that ended up never activating. A lot did go my way as in spite of concerted efforts by zombies and blightlord terminators the other deathwing refused to lose combat and ended up breaking these formations against all the odds. The Dark angels aircraft were good, the nephilim are more dedicated anti-air now but the dark talons are very potent and took a toll on Ian's retinues. The game to a surprise early finish at the end of turn 3 as I had secured the blitz objective as well as take and hold versus no objectives for Ian. There were still rather a lot of Death guard on the table but only about half of it unbroken.



Second game Ian was testing out zombie spam and it's horribly effective for table domination. Both of us were using very different lists with my trying out cyclone terminators and a relic formation (a special predator executioner and laser destroyer formation of tanks) My list was not well equipped to counter Ian's massed teleporters but it was a game of positioning and threat projection where Ian had a significant advantage in activations, even if most of those were spent getting in the way of the Dark angels...



Unique unit reviews:



Land speeder vengeance: Although I didn't mention these in the summaries I used a formation of them in both lists and they are amazingly effective and efficient... too efficient. There is no way I won't upgrade tornados to these and although I don't want to slow them down or change the plasma storm battery profile they are too much of a bargain with assault cannon on top. A unit of 5 puts down 15 shots to 30cm that can take on tanks and infantry equally well, plus they can garrison (because of scout) and therefore deploy in Overwatch. They were amazing in both games, even though in the second they spent both turns diving into firefights to break and scatter zombie formations.

My suggestion here is to just change the assault cannon to heavy bolters. It's a minor drop in firepower against tanks but I think it's a significant enough change to put the tornado back as a reasonable cheaper option. (10pts for 1 extra AP/AT 5+ shot as opposed to 2 extra AP/AT 5+ instead of an AP 5+.)



Deimos Relic formation: A nice big tank formation that brings long range macro and tank busting weaponry to the table. Expensive and no access to upgrades is a shame but they can definitely bring the hurt and put it where you want it. No real complaints or issues with this unit but I would like another game or two. (One where they are not hounded by zombies and blightlord terminators all game...)



Cyclone terminators: I don't like them. They cost more but lose out on FF and CC (dropping from 3+ to 4+) and although they potentially will pump out an impressive sounding 3 missile shots each those are AP5+/AT6 so whilst you get more shots with greater range they are less effective against armour and the unit is significantly worse in engagements. They also lack character upgrade options. I didn't have much chance with them as Ian won Initiative the turn they teleported down and promptly swatted them but they don't look or feel as useful as regular terminators.



Co-ordinated telport: This new unique rule was pretty significant in the first game and I can see it being very well exploited, it makes teleporting troops much easier to support and also much more reactive to the action. Coming down immediately after a space craft bombardment and planetfall units definitely improves the odds of them finding a vulnerable foe to abuse and pummel into submission.



Ravenwing attack formation: the change to this formation was to drop a speeder and add a stand of black knights (who gain scout and a macro weapon CC attack over regular bikes as well as the commander ability). So the same total number of stands but more bikes rather than equal numbers of bikes and speeders. I like the formation, they still make a great, if no ideal, place for a character and in particular a grandmaster. (For that ever so clutch re-roll.) A stand with 2 macro CC 3+ attacks is not to be sniffed at. The formation went up in cost compared to the EpicUK list and I'm not entirely convinced that the changes justify it but the formation is still a very good unit.



Devastators: Plasma going to AP/AT 5+ but without slow-firing is a bit of a wash for me, it's rare I ever get to shoot more than once with them anyway but this is still quite a nice formation because of the upgrade options. Mortis dreadnought and stalkers are fine additions and I'll give them their own piece. Devastators still have a place in DA lists, ought to give them a chance in drop pods... although I don't know how their upgrade units work for that?



Mortis dreadnought: Cheap, reasonable rate of fire with unreliable but relevant AA presence. A nice option to those units that can take them. Very helpful for improving the survivability of the other AV units in formations.

Stalkers: Similar to the dreadnoughts, decent firepower that works across plenty of targets and not too expensive.



Nephilim: Their new dedicated AA role (all their guns have AA to varying degrees of reliability and range) giving them up to 3 shots each in dogfights... Ian didn't bring any aircraft so their somewhat disparate collection of ground attack shots mean they aren't great for that. Although it's rather fitting I sort of miss an earlier version with the avenger mega bolter.



Dark talon: These are a bit like the land speeder vengeance, possibly a bit too good. Although all its guns are only 15cm range with FxF arcs they bring disrupt barrage, macro weapon (on a 3+ no less) and an off-chance AP/AA shot as well. These were a real thorn to Ian in both games even when my dice weren't being kind. The macro weapon needs to be a little less reliable perhaps (4+ say) because as the formation is currently... I'm always going to take them. With co-ordinated teleport and planetfall there are many ways to disrupt and mess with enemy AA and the nephilim are perfect to run cover for them.

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The Wargaming Trader
NetEA Death Guard Army Champion

More from Richard:

Comments about the Nurgle armies used and their units.

Nurgle's rot:

The new version of Nurgle's rot seems pretty good. Daemons always appear quite tricky to use and remembering to bring them in is very easy to forget. The new rule doesn't help with any of those issues but being able to top up the daemon pool requires less investment for more opportunities to exploit it. It makes it easier to have a substantial daemon pool mid-to late game so you are less cautious about wasting them early on in perhaps unimportant gambles.



Zombies: These formations annoy me... a lot. In the second game Ian had I think 4 formations of them and they flooded the table, taking up a lot of board space and boxing me in very effectively. I do not want to see this happen more often. 1-2 formations (plus the one you get from the spacecraft bombardment) is just about fine.



Blightlord terminators: These seem so difficult to balance, they scare the crap out of me because Ian can make saves in a way I rarely can and their potential ought to be good but in neither game did they get to do anything major. The first game Ian was cautious and very unlucky losing a combat he ought to have won and I kept them broken as perpetually as I could thereafter. Nurgling stands to provide extra bases against blast breaking them is an excellent counter to that weakness and I just hope we can think of a better solution for them to do more work.



Blight drones: I still hate these things, in the second game Ian fielded two units and they were as always very potent and a pig to deal with. When I look at the AAC formation of vindicators I notice that, although the drones have 1 less stand and are Initiative 2+ they are just as tough, much faster and have better firepower. They are also fearless. I'm not sure what do do about them yet but I'd ideally like to see them be slightly less all-round good. Either slight less effective directly or a little less resilient. (Change to LV insteand of AV perhaps?) I am quite biased though and forget that they are easily spammed.

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NetEA Death Guard Army Champion

Glad to see it used to effect. I've been a bit puzzled on how to use it myself, as you only get one retain combined assault after the Spaceship arrives, and I might be a bit too chicken sometimes when using drop pods.

Need to look into the Nephilim / Dark Talon section for sure. Might be that the Dark Talon is slightly too powerful, while the Nephilims are a tad too expensive.

The same is true of the Land Speeder Typhoon however. And I'd argue they're actually better at doing OW due to them having 45cm range. But the Venegance does have a higher potential.

I haven't seen any problems with this either. It's fun, but you're unlikely to spam it.

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AC for Traitor Titan Legion and Hive Fleet Dagon

Part of the problem might be that the basic Tornado is slightly too expensive for what you get. There's a reason you never see them in the Vanilla Astartes list (everyone takes the basic LS for the Macro FF). So right now I'm thinking of lowering the basic cost of them and perhaps also the Scouts to 175 while nerfing the Venegance somewhat, maybe giving it 30cm move. When I tried this in my latest game they had a hard time getting into range, since that shaves off 10cm from a double. I also found that against opponents with flyers they had a hard time staying alive. They're LV after all, and not any more durable than the LS Tornados.

This way there's a 75 point difference instead of 50. I rather like the feel of them being quite different from each other, and not just a beefier Tornado with 2 AP5+/AT5+ attacks.




Glad you liked them! Have yet to try them out myself.



The way I've been looking to use them is by teleporting them down and then putting them on OW. Alternatively they can be used to create nasty crossfires. I think the extra range compared to the normal DW terminators allows them to position more defensively, and not be as vulnerable to losing the initiative. That being said I'm going to take another look at these.



There's definitely a lot of potential with this rule, but I've found it requires quite a bit more planning to use than the normal Thunderhawk + Terminators combo.



Might be that it could be lowered slightly in cost.



I've also been using these in Thunderhawk Transporters, it's the closest the DA gets to a normal Air Assault formation, and they can then zoom off in their Rhinos.



I'm quite pleased with both of these, happy to see others think the same.

I'm thinking of lowering the cost of these to 200, as they're not particularly good at doing ground attacks. They do get a lot of AA attacks, but they're no Nightwings.



Sounds reasonable to me.

And thanks for the batrep and the feedback!

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AC for Traitor Titan Legion and Hive Fleet Dagon

Another thing I was curious about is how you found the Land Raider formation with 3 Land Raiders? Personally I find it makes them a lot more likely to be taken than the 4 LR formation, and is a pretty good replacement for the list not having Predator Annihilators. I've always been bothered with the Land Raider not being used much in Vanilla Marines.

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AC for Traitor Titan Legion and Hive Fleet Dagon

Personally I think the three Land Raider formation works better, by still having plenty of punch but being cheap enough to take.

Something we discussed after the game but forgot to write down is the possibility of adding a Deathwing Land Raider upgrade, either by adding a fourth model or bumping the three existing models up to DW Land Raiders.

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The Wargaming Trader
NetEA Death Guard Army Champion

That's a really interesting suggestion actually. I think the best way to do this within the existing framework is to simply add another formation to the "Ravenwing / Deathwing Specialist Detachments" section that's 3 Deathwing Land Raiders for 275 points.

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AC for Traitor Titan Legion and Hive Fleet Dagon

Interesting BR!! glad to see Nurgle's forces in action.

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