Warhammer Fantasy on the Cheap: Daemons of Chaos

Since the Daemons of Chaos codex came out during the heyday of 7^th Edition, it has been a staple of the top tables of Fantasy tournaments.  The codex really does have it all: powerful magic, very powerful close combat units and a couple strong shooty units.  It isn’t very hard to make a strong DoC list if you stick to Tzeentch and Khorne.  Luckily, with the launch of plastic Horrors, making a good list can be done cheaply, too.

As always let’s start with the Battalion.  Fail.  Half the box are garbage Slannesh units.  Serious, GW must have realized how bad they messed up when they spent tons of cash on Seekers molds that literally nobody bought.  Not to mention that Daemonettes aren’t good in Fantasy or 40k and you have a bucket of failure.  So we will pass on the Battlion, unfortunately.

Let’s start with our Lords and Heroes.  Well, just Heroes.  In a 2k list, we don’t get to bring any Lords.  Sorry folks, I’m not going to lie that I’m happy not to have to face Bloodthirsters at 2,000 points.

The army will be lead (symbolically) by a Herald of Tzeentch.  Since the Herald model is some obscene price, use the new Changeling model as your Herald.  No one will compain.  The Herald of Tzeentch is a powerful wizard and he makes your best unit, Horrors, even better.  Full of the win.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440043a&prodId=prod1160092a

We are also going to need a Herald of Khorne to be the general.  The models available are less than interesting.  The Skulltaker would be a good choice, but the finecast version is an absolutely ridiculous $34.  Pass on that noise.  My advice for a Herald model would be to buy old school Bloodletter metal model on eBay and paint him up.  He will look distinctive enough from the new plastic ones to have the effect we want.  If you fall in love with the army, you can buy the forgeworld Herald later and have really cool general.  Point for point, the Herald of Khorne is the nastiest close combat Hero level dude going, besides the Skulltaker himself.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/3-METAL-CLASSIC-CHAOS-BLOODLETTERS-OLD-OOP-UNPAINTED-/150661183425?pt=UK_Toys_Wargames_RL&hash=item23141b37c1

So for core.  We want to start out with 30 Pink Horrors.  This the anvil.  A unit that is a level 3 wizard in it’s own right casting Bolt of Changes like they are going out of style.  Think that’s not going to draw dispel dice?  2d6 hits at str d6+4?  It will take out your opponent’s best units with ease.  Additionally, they have a 4++ ward save making them very tough to shift.  

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440043a&prodId=prod860024a

3 boxes set us back $87.00 and give us plenty of extra little Chaos-y bits to push through other projects.  This unit is approximately 400 points, so we are already getting where we need to be.

Next, we add 20 Bloodletters.  Two boxes cost us $58.00 and give us the Hammer.  With the Herald in the mix, this is a unit that will kill with ease anything it fights short of Swordmasters of Hoeth.  At about 300 points, this will get us to our 1,000 point list nicely.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440043a&prodId=prod1170244

Herald of Tzeentch

-Master of Sorcery (Life)

=140

Herald of Khorne

=100

30x Horrors

-Musician

-Standard

-Icon of Sorcery

=393

20x Bloodletters

-Musician

-Standard

-Champion

-Icon of Endless War

=295

So we have a nice 1000 point list that has absolutely overpowering magic at 1,000 points and better close combat than most lists at this level.  Expanding it to 2,000 points means adding some goodies, since we have the basics spoken for.

First, I want to add 10 more Bloodletters.  Getting 30 strong really makes the unit fearsome, so we can allocate $29.00 towards that, easily.

Now the fun part.  I want a unit of Flamers, since they are one of the scariest shooting units in the game.  Two boxes of finecast Flamers isn’t cheap for 6 models, but we can indulge on some units if we skimp on other units, right?  $46 well spent.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440045a&prodId=prod1160157a

I want two units of 10 Fleshhounds.  These hit as hard as Chaos Knights and are a bit cheaper since they don’t have 2+ armor.  But these models aren’t cheap!  Correct, but there is a solution: Chaos Warhounds with a red paint job.  Two boxes of plastic Chaos Warhounds and we have our Fleshhounds for very cheaply.  $50 cheaply.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440109a&prodId=prod1570038

Incidentally, we are now at about 2k points.  What do we have for a final list?

Herald of Tzeentch

-Master of Sorcer (Life)

=140

Herald of Khorne

-Armor of Khorne

-Firestorm Blade

=140

30x Horrors

-Musician

-Standard

-Icon of Sorcery

=393

30x Bloodletters

-Musician

-Standard

-Champion

-Icon of Endless War

=415

6x Flamers of Tzeentch

=270

9x Fleshhounds

 =315

9x Fleshhounds

=315

Total:  1,988

Total Cost: $243.00 with 20% internet discount

What do you think?  $243 is pretty cheap for a rather strong list.  If you wanted to go more magic heavy, you could drop a unit of Hounds and add another HoT with a Master of Sorcery in a different Lore, and maybe find the points for Skulltaker.  Lot's of ways to go.