Welcome back as we take a closer look at the Death Guard Troops section of the codex. On the one hand, there is very little variety available in terms of unit choices. On the other, however, the Plague Marines provide a multitude of customization options!
Death Guard Troops; Plague Marines
Plague Marines are the only actual marines in your Troops section. However, with Death Guard resiliency, toughness, and wounds they last far longer than you would expect.
The box contains 7 plague marines. Now to Nurgle, seven is a sacred number. Back in earlier editions, having seven marines in a Death Guard unit conferred special rules and advantages. Today, going with seven brings disadvantages and doesn’t grant any extra options. Instead, with 7 you’ll pay more to put the unit in Strategic Reserves, blast weapons get a minimum of 3 attacks on the unit, and you’re paying for a full 10 in Narrative games. Stick with small units of 5 marines.
Plague Marine Options
On the customization front, Plague Marines have an entire page for their datasheet. You may construct a vicious melee squad, focus on bolters, or stack up with special weapons.
Plague knives already make a Death Guard squad dangerous in melee with Plague Weapon and -1 AP. Replacing the boltgun makes them even deadlier in melee. Each of the marines may replace their boltgun with a single, different, melee weapon. A flail of corruption is an automatic choice as it doubles the number of hit rolls you make. Since the melee weapon replaces the boltgun, any model with a new plague weapon gains an additional attack for carrying 2 plague weapons! The only weapon not a plague weapon is the optional champion’s power fist, so freely upgrade.
If you’d like to play a solid ranged game, a pure boltgun armed squad forms a strong unit. You’ll rely on the Malicious Volleys ability to keep up a high rate of fire. The few options you’ll want to take are a blight launcher and a sigil of decay. The blight launcher gives you Strength 6, -2 AP, and 2 Damage along with Plague Weapon rule. The sigil of decay allows unmodified hit rolls of 6 to auto wound. Plop them down on an objective and gun down all comers.
Finally, you may upgrade your boltguns into many different weapons. A 5 marine squad may take a blight launcher and a plague spewer. A third marine may carry a meltagun, plasma gun, or plague belcher. Most of these are assault weapons or automatically hit and suit an aggressive play style. Outfit your final marine with a flail of corruption to give yourself punch when assaulted.
Plague Champion
You’ll notice I haven’t dealt with the Plague Champion so far. As a squad leader, he comes with a separate set of options. Upgrade to match your squad role. Replacing his plague knife with a daemonic plague blade is automatic. You’re gaining +1 Strength and not losing anything. His boltgun may be replaced with a bolt pistol, plasma pistol, or plasma gun. Pistols are always a good choice if you intend to assault. Whether you take a bolt or plasma depends on how many point you have. The plasma gun is a neat option for a squad leaning into special weapons, however, those weapons add up quick and it doesn’t benefit from Malicious Volleys or the sigil of decay.
Death Guard Troops; Followers
The remaining two options for Death Guard Troops are Poxwalkers and Death Guard Cultists. Both have the keyword Plague Followers. This keyword limits their numbers in your force. You may not have more plague followers than Bubonic Astartes Core Infantry units in each detachment.
Naturally, Plague Marines posses the Bubonic Astartes Core Infantry keywords. Likewise, your Blightlord Terminators, Possessed, and Deathshroud Terminators also have the correct keywords. Check what you have before adding plague followers!
Poxwalkers
With a Toughness of 4, automatically passing morale tests (Fodder ability), and negating wounds on 6 (Unending Hordes ability), poxwalkers are the best objective holders per point in the entire codex. They come in large units, which leverages their abilities, and replace their losses with the Curse of the Walking Pox ability. They also are another source for spreading the Contagions of Nurgle across the field.
In short, cheap, tough, good; pick three.
Death Guard Cultists
Hordes of poor deluded cultists form a staple of Chaos in the fiction and some earlier editions. In the Death Guard, they’re almost completely eclipsed by poxwalkers. While they share a similar cost and may come with as many as 30 bodies, cultists lack their Toughness and have no abilities to help them stay in the battle. They even lack any ability to spread the Contagions of Nurgle!
What do they have? Ranged attacks with autoguns or minor melee ability with an auto pistol and brutal assault weapon. They also have access to 1 flamer or heavy stubber per 10 cultists. Personally, take the flamers, you’re guaranteed hits with those.
Cultists have one other problem at the moment. There isn’t a dedicated kit. The Cultists of the Abyss box from Warhammer Quest: Blackstone Fortress gives you 8 models; a heavy stubber, a grenade launcher, 4 autoguns, one armed with pistol and chainsword, and the ornate leader armed with a flaming staff. While adaptable, pretend the grenade launcher is a big bore autogun, you’re locked into needing two kits to field one 10 strong unit. It gets worse if you want to field one at maximum size. Or you can hunt for the old Dark Vengeance cultists on second hand sites to build up your horde.
With any luck, when Games Workshop revisits Codex: Chaos Space Marines releases for ninth we’ll see new cultists. I’d even settle for a rerelease of the mono-pose cultists from editions past.
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