Wood Elves vs Daemons of Chaos Tactica - asrai.druchii.net
Jan 23, 2021 8:23:14 GMT
via Tapatalk
knoffles likes this
Post by strutsagget on Jan 23, 2021 8:23:14 GMT
So In my quest for preserving I will move some well written stuff I found elsewhere:
Written by godswearhats
asrai.druchii.net/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=%2025906
This is (I hope) a comprehensive overview of the Daemons of Chaos army and how to defeat it. I will touch on all units, but focus heavily on those that I see in more competitive lists / at tournaments. The focus is on how to defeat these units with Wood Elves.
For chronological purposes, this is for 8th edition Warhammer, using 8th Edition Daemons book and 6th Edition Wood Elves book.
Overview
Daemons all have a 5++ Ward Save, magical attacks, cause Fear and are Unbreakable. Yes, all of those things. All units.
OK, now that's sunk in, let's look at the bright side. Being evil fiends and servants of the whimsical and tyrannical Chaos powers, they also have a form of Unstable. If they lose combat, instead of making a break test, they make a Leadership test with a modifier based on the combat result, and however many they fail by they lose that many extra wounds. However, on a roll of double-1, they get all the models back that they lost that round, and on a roll of double-6 the whole unit is sucked into the void. (These last two don't happen very often, so they aren't a big factor in the game).
Also, when they roll winds of magic each round, they have to consult a special table. Rolling low usually does something bad to units which follow one of the four gods, while rolling high usually does something good. Rolling very high (11-12) can enable them to put new units on the table, while conversely rolling 2-3 means they are likely to lose models.
Having Magical Attacks negates all our Forest Spirit ward saves, making most of those units a poor choice against Daemons. If I'm tailoring my list, I tend to take an all-elf list. In addition, with all units being Unbreakable, you have to really kill the unit in order to have any chance to win.
Each Daemon is a Daemon of one of the four gods: Slaanesh (lust), Khorne (blood), Nurgle (plague) or Tzeentch (change). Slaanesh and Khorne Daemons Hate each other, as do Nurgle/Tzeentch. Each Daemon also has an extra special rule. Slaanesh: Armour Piercing, Khorne: +1 S on the charge, Nurgle: -1 to hit them in close combat, Tzeentch: re-roll Ward Saves rolls of 1 (and wizards re-roll channeling rolls of 1).
Daemons can't take regular magic items. There will be no Dispel Scroll in a Daemon army. They can take magical banners, and they also get two special ways to get cool stuff. One is Daemonic Gifts and the other is Loci of Chaos. I'll cover Loci of Chaos under Heralds, but the common rules are that the Herald and the unit it is in gets a special rule, and the biggest Locus wins (there are three levels at different points costs - if there are two Heralds in a unit, the Loci don't stack).
Daemonic gifts come in 3 flavors - lesser, greater and exalted (or 25, 50 and 75 pts). At the start of the battle, these gifts are rolled on a table. They are all good. Any gift can be exchanged for a magic weapon of the same/less points, even after being rolled (this is about the only way Daemons can get any choice on magic items). Frequently this means the lesser gift turns into a Sword of Swift Slaying or Striking. There are also special weapons that are available depending on the god. They cannot exchange them for anything other than magical weapons though. The Exalted gifts can be exchanged for "Hellforged Artifacts". I'll cover those toward the end, as they are pretty special and army lists can be built around some of them. Examples of gifts include ASF, Impact Hits (D3), Multiple Wounds (2) at the low end, 2+ AS, Scaly Skin (5+), +2 A in the medium gifts, and +3 S or +2 T at the top end. Our only consolation is that they are random :-)
Daemons have the same lores as their Warriors of Chaos counterparts, but with a different lore attribute. All the attributes bring on more Daemon models when spells cause wounds. Daemonettes or Fiends for Slaanesh, Plaguebearers or Nurglings for Nurgle and Pink Horrors or Screamers for Tzeentch (it's easier for them to bring on the Core unit type, and they can only add to a unit within 12" of the caster).
The Army
Each of the gods has a Greater Daemon (Lord level) and a Herald (Hero level). All Greater Daemons have WS/S/T6 minimum, and W5 minimum. There are also a slew of special characters, but I'm only really going to go into detail about one of them (Epidimius) because he's the most common (and arguably the most broken). They are all powerful in different ways, and also expensive in terms of points. Each god also has a single Core unit, and units in Special and Rare.
Rather than go by army section, I'll go by god as you're more likely to see armies of one god (or two) than three or four. Inspiring Presence and Hold Your Ground only work if the character and the unit taking the Ld test are from the same god. There are a few units that can be taken in any army and turned into a Deamon of any god - I'll cover those at the end.
Slaanesh
Greater Daemon: Keeper of Secrets. Doesn't fly but has M10 anyway. As you might expect, it's no slouch in close combat. It is also usually a wizard (can be up to L4), and runs either lore of Slaanesh or Shadow. Like most monsters, Amber Spear / Dwellers are good options, however he/she has no armor save, so even long range Glade Guard fire is effective (assuming your opponent didn't roll some armor on the gifts table).
Herald: Can be mounted on a Steed of Slaanesh (Fast Cav, M10, 1 Poisoned Attack) or a chariot. The Loci here are pretty annoying. Lesser gives the ability to auto-pass any characteristic test (except Ld), dangerous terrain test or Look Out Sir! roll. This means that both Dwellers Below and Curse of Anraheir are useless. The Greater locus gives them ASF, and the exalted makes it such that if they issue a challenge, it can't be refused and they get to choose who accepts AND every model in base contact with the unit gets -3 to their Initiative. Solution: turn them into pincushions as their Toughness is low (3) and their armor save is non-existent. He/she/it can be a L1 wizard on Shadow or Slaanesh.
Core: Daemonettes are WS5 with 2 attacks, but only S/T 3. They are not tough, but are still unbreakable which sucks. Again, my normal reaction would be to throw Dryads at them, but the lack of Ward save for our Forest Spirits means that best case we'd do 4 wounds, take 4 wounds back and lose to static combat resolution. Eternal Guard is a fair fight, so if you have greater static combat res, you should win any fight against Daemonettes and grind them out. This doesn't hold true if they have ASF though, so be careful.
Special: Seekers are Daemonettes on the back of Steeds of Slaanesh. Being Unbreakable Fast Cav, you won't ever see the double flee. Fiends are Monstrous Beasts that give -1 WS and I to anything in base contact, and have the combat stats of a Dryad, but with 3W and 3A. Seeker Chariots (along with the Rare choice 'Exalted Seeker Chariot') are only S/T/W 4 with a 6+ AS, but they are M10 and the exalted does 2D6+1 impact hits (and has 8 wounds). A Herald can be mounted on one. Again, don't engage if you can avoid them, or attack from the rear or side for extra combat resolution. (This message is a common pattern throughout the tactica - it's about the only way to deal with Unbreakable units). The crew are only S3. If you treat Slaanesh daemons as daemonic elves, you'll get the right idea.
Rare: Apart from the Exalted chariot, they also have a Hellflayer, which sounds a lot worse than it is. It's another chariot, with a similar profile, but it gives +1 A to the main rider for every impact hit wound it causes.
Lore of Slaanesh: There are three spells in here that are worth discussing (the others are fairly straightforward). One is Acquiescence, a hex which gives the unit ASL and Random Movement D6. Now you can't flee or charge, which is a bit of a pain, and it's only a 6+ to cast. The second is Phantasmagoria, which makes you take a Ld test with an extra D6, and discard the lowest. The really bad part about this is the boosted version hits all enemy units within 24". When half the army causes Terror and the whole army causes Fear, this is pretty bad. The final one is Cacophonic Choir, which is the same as Acquiesence, plus 2D6 hits that wound on a 4+ with no AS AND it can be boosted to hit every enemy unit within 12". Keep an eye out for those two spells as they can wreck your day if he rolls well on the winds of magic.
Special characters: nothing to be scared of.
Khorne
Khorne is the god of blood, skulls, battle, etc. None of his Daemons can be wizards, and most (if not all) have Magic Resistance of some sort and the lowest WS is 5.
Greater Daemon: Bloodthirster. Flying, and very killy. This will kill pretty much anything in our army (including a Treeman) pretty handily. However, it only has a 5+/5++, so concentrated missile fire will kill it - 40 shots will do on average 2 wounds (it's T6), so try to get as much missile fire on it as you can. MR 2, so a little harder to kill with Amber Spear.
Herald: can be mounted on a Juggernaut (which makes it pretty badass monstrous cav - see Bloodcrushers) or on a Blood Throne (a very nasty chariot - see Skull Cannon). The Loci available to it are (in ascending order): Magic Resistance 2, Frenzy, Hatred. WS7 on a hero level character.
Core: Bloodletter. These used to be much scarier than they are, but they still have Scaly Skin 6, MR 1, and Killing Blow with WS5 and S4 (5 on the charge). They are only T3, so they fall to long-range bow-fire, but remember they are Unbreakable.
Special: Bloodcrushers. This is a Bloodletter mounted on a Juggernaut. They have a 4+ AS, S5, W3 and A3, so while they aren't the annoying 1+ AS Monstrous Cav of some armies, they can still be quite formidable. If the unit is large, redirect them. Otherwise, try to get flank/combo charges on them. They can get especially nasty if a Herald is in with them.Fleshhounds: Ambushing war beasts, with MR 3, 2A and 2W.
Rare: Skull Cannon: Expect to see two of these pretty regularly. Flaming, magical cannon on the back of a chariot that is no slouch in close combat. It can regain wounds (any of its impact hits that wound cause it to regain a wound on a 4+). This is the same Blood Throne chariot that a Herald can ride (it's unusual though). If he's on one, his Locus extends to all Khorne units within 6". The Skull Cannon are a priority to kill if you have any Treemen or Treekin on the board. Use your fast cav or Eagle / Eagle Noble to get behind or beside them and then charge (thus avoiding the chariot attacks).
Special characters: even more killy versions of their already killy stuff. Be aware that they have a Fleshhound special character - unusual to see a War Beast character of any sort. Their Hero level character, Skulltaker, will kill pretty much anything in a challenge (he gets HKB in a challenge), but he also can't refuse a challenge (in case that becomes useful). I generally just don't want to get into combat with any of their characters if I can avoid it.
Nurgle
Nurgle is probably the most powerful of the mono-god builds, and that's primarily because of Epidemius, Nurgle's Tallyman. He's a special character, and I'm going to start with him because if you see him on the battlefield, he is absolutely your number one priority to kill. Here's how he works. The Daemon player keeps account of all unsaved Wounds caused by Daemons of Nurgle or Nurgle spells. Then there's a table of cumulative bonuses that ALL Daemons of Nurgle get as the wound count rises. The table kicks in at every 7 wounds, starting with +1 S, then +1 T, then Killing Blow, then re-roll failed ward saves. It doesn't take very long to get to 14 Wounds, which in effect gives every Nurgle daemon a permanent Wyssan's Wildform. Annoyingly, Epidemius is on a Palanquin of Nurgle (a throne carried by Nurglings) which makes him Monstrous Cavalry. He's T5, with 4W (he gets SA at S5 and his throne gets 6A at S3) so be careful. The good news is that he usually runs in a unit of Plaguebearers, so he won't get a Look Out, Sir! although he does give his unit Poisoned Attacks that wound on a 5+ instead of a 6+.
OK, now that you've been warned, on to the rest of the Nurgle daemons. Nurgle, as mentioned is the god of plagues, disease and all sorts of other nastiness. The miniatures are super-gross.
Greater Daemon: Great Unclean One is T/W 7 with Poisoned Attacks, and can be up a L4 Wizard on either Nurgle or Death. You'll see both, because Death is arguably more powerful but Nurgle keeps Epidemius' tally higher (don't let your opponent tally wounds caused by Death). Again, no armor save and only M6, so stay as far away as possible and turn it into a pincushion. Even Flock of Doom can help with this guy. He commonly carries the Balesword which gives him Poisoned Attacks and Multiple Wounds (D3) ... yuck!
Herald: Epidemius is technically herald, but you'll see others as well. They can be L1 Wizards on Nurgle or Death. The lesser locus makes poisoned attacks wound on a 5+, the greater gives Regeneration and the Exalted gives an additional S4 hit if a poisoned attack rolls a 6 to hit. All of these are nasty. Heralds are S/T 5 but generally only have W2 unless they are mounted on a Palanquin like Epidemius.
Core: Plaguebearers are WS 3, S/T 4 with 1 attack. You'll get -1 to hit in close combat, which means you're still hitting on 4s no matter what. They aren't terribly threatening, but a unit of 10 will beat just about any other equivalent size unit we have in the long run, and the Poisoned Attacks mean that even Treemen aren't a good option. Shoot them, and get combo flank/rear charges as best you can.
Special: Beasts of Nurgle are arguably the best 60pt unit in the game. M6, S4, T5, W4 and D6+1 attacks, with poison and regeneration. They can also challenge as if they are characters and enemies get no bonus for flank/rear attacks. Like all Nurgle Daemons, they have low initiative, but you really can't kill them in one turn because they have such a small frontage (50mm). Either charge them and accept the casualties, avoid them, or shoot them. Try to avoid wasting time on them because they are so cheap you don't get many points for killing them. Nurglings are Swarms with Scout. 4W and 4A but only S/T3. These guys won't do much in combat, but they are annoying and will hold up units.
Rare: Plague Drones are Monstrous Cav with the Hover rule (just like Fly but can't March). They can be upgraded with a poisoned 12" shooting attack that does D3 wounds, and are T5 with 3 wounds. Avoid, shoot, combo charge.
Lore of Nurgle: This Lore sucks for us. A lot of the spells require you to pass a Toughness test or take a wound. In fact, Rancid Visitations does D6 S5 hits, and then repeatedly does D6 S5 hits until you pass a Toughness test. There's also a spell that will reduce Toughness by D3, and the signature spell is a flame template where everything underneath takes a wound if they fail the Toughness test. So yes, this lore sucks. Typically the main caster is either a Daemon Prince (see later) or a Greater Daemon, but if Epidemius is on the battlefield he's still your number one priority to kill, and the wizard can wait. Otherwise, kill the wizard quick.
Tzeentch
Tzeentch is probably the least popular of the four, partially because your Lore choices are Tzeentch (which is very random) and Metal, and partially because a lot of attacks have the Warpflame special rule. Anything that is wounded by an attack / spell with this special rule takes a Toughness test at the end of the phase and suffers D3 wounds if they fail, but gets Regeneration 6+ if they succeed. That weirdness puts a lot of players off. Also, Warpflame is not Flaming. Weird, huh?
Greater Daemon: Lord of Change is always at least a L2 wizard (Metal or Tzeentch). Other than that, he has the same abilities as all the other Greater Daemons. He's not very scary in comparison to some others. The Tzeentch magic item that is most popular is the Wand of Whimsy, which gets charged up on a D6 roll of 5+ after the bearer casts or dispels. For every charge, you get +1S and +1A.
Herald: Again, they are always wizards (at least L1) on Metal or Tzeentch. I'll explain the Lesser Locus under Pink Horrors below. The Greater Locus gives the Herald and unit Strength D6, rolled at the start of each turn (I've not seen this taken) and the Exalted gives +1 S to any spells cast by the Herald or any models in his unit. The Heralds are pretty crappy in combat, which is another reason people don't take them. They can be mounted on a Disc of Tzeentch, which is like being mounted on a crappy Great Eagle.
Core: Pink Horrors (who amusingly have a special rule called Blue Horrors (because there used to a unit with that name)) are the meager core offering for Tzeentch. These are easily the worst combat unit, but they count as a L1 Wizard of Tzeentch, with an additional +1 to cast for each rank they have (up to +3). They take 2D6 S10 hits on a miscast though :-) The Blue Horrors special rule is a strange one. For each Pink Horror that dies, put two counters beside the unit. Once combat is over, roll a D6 for each counter and on a 4+ the opposing unit takes a S2 hit. Any wounds count toward combat resolution. The lesser locus means you put D3+1 of these counters instead. So, while they are easy to kill in combat, there's a good chance that they'll take a couple more elves with them, and in a unit of 20 can be a really annoying grinding unit (especially as they get to replenish themselves due to the Lore attribute).
Special: Flamers of Tzeentch are supporting fire - Multiple Shots D6, range 18" S4, unit size 3-6. These guys can really mess up an elf unit, but again aren't seen a lot because they have Warpflame and there are so many other choices. Screamers are a type of War Beast that can fly and do Multiple Wounds (D3) against Large Targets in close combat and D3 S4 attacks on a unit that they've flown over in the Remaining Moves phase.
Rare: Burning Chariots of Tzeentch are T4 chariots with no armor save that has random strength (D6) Warpflame shooting attacks. I don't know why anyone would ever take one of these, and this really is the nail on the Tzeentch coffin.
Lore of Tzeentch: There are no augments in this Lore - it's pretty much all direct damage and magic missiles, and the Strength is almost always random (D6). Expect people to take Metal on their Tzeentch wizards where possible. The only standout spell is one that targets an enemy wizard - both wizards roll a D6 and add their Level, and if the enemy loses, he takes a wound, loses a wizard level, and a random spell which the Tzeentch wizard gains. This Lore makes me mildly concerned that the rewritten Lore of Athel Loren will remain sub-par :-(
Special Characters: You don't see them much, but they're basically all spellcasters with some special abilities. Just ask your opponent about their special rules, as none of them are particularly scary or game changing. My buddy is going to start playing a lot with Kairos Fateweaver. He gets to more or less choose 8 spells from the Battle Lores as well as knowing all Tzeentch spells. He also allows a re-roll of a single D6 per turn. So he can cast some Death spells to generate extra power dice, and then throw a giant Fireball or whatever. Seems like it might be good, but I reserve judgment until I see him in action.
Unaligned Daemons
These are the Daemon models that are neutral or can be upgraded to be a Daemon of any particular god, and so are equally likely to appear in any army.
Chaos Furies are a special choice. They are a flying chaff unit, similar to Harpies. They serve no other real purpose.
Daemon Prince is a Lord choice that has all the same ridiculous stats as his WoC counterpart. The big difference is that he does not have access to magic items in the same way, and so can't get the 1+ AS etc. Typically this model will be the general, an L4 wizard, will have 4+ AS, Fly and 75 points of Daemonic Gifts. He's a lot easier to kill because of the AS, and at T5, concentrated Glade Guard shooting will kill it pretty quickly. He must select one of the four gods and so will have their ability as mentioned at the top.
Soul Grinder is a Monster with M8, S6 and T7 who must select one of the four gods to follow. Watch out if this is in a Nurgle army with Epidemius. He comes with a grapeshot-only cannon by default, but he can upgrade that to fire thrower, bolt thrower or stone thrower, all of which can be fired even if he moves. He also has a special rule whereby he can pick a model in close combat and grab it with his claw - if the model fails an intiative test it gets grabbed. A grabbed model is hit automatically with all four attacks. There's a final upgrade called the Daemonbone Claw which means the Soul Grinder can trade all his attacks for a single S10, D6 wounds attack instead - these two in combo mean a very dead Treeman in all likelihood. This guy is hard to kill but can be avoided due to his sheer size. He's only WS3, so if you have someone on WS7 who can't be stomped, you'll likely be able to kill it. At Ld 7, you could even risk the Spirit Sword ;-)
Hellforged Artifacts
I wanted to talk about three of these in particular, because they can be a bit of surprise if you don't know they exist.
The Portalglyph allows a unit to be kept in the Realm of Chaos, and placed within 12" (+3d6" scatter) of the bearer. It's not a huge shocker, because first he has to drop the Portalglyph, and the unit can come in on any subsequent turn. Still, it means that it can be quite easy to get a big unit in behind your back lines on Turn 3.
The Rock of Inevitability drops a Cursed Bulwark up to 8" long in front of the bearer (one use only). Then every turn after that, roll a D6. 1-3 does nothing, 4-5 adds another Bulwark and 6 adds a Watchtower (they must all be continuous). Wood Elves (and other forces of order) are at -2 initiative when in base contact. This can really mess with our shooting too, giving hard cover to units that otherwise looked vulnerable.
The Chromatic Tome allows the Chaos player to re-roll the Winds of Magic. If he does, you get to re-roll them in your phase too. This can lead to very magic heavy games, and also allows your opponent to be more likely to avoid bad affects on the table that I mentioned earlier. This makes it even more critical to keep your wizard alive and kill theirs.
Summary
Daemons are a horrible matchup for anyone because they are Unbreakable, but particularly bad for us because they negate all Forest Spirit wards and we generally have terrible static combat resolution. The best successes I've had have come from running all-elf lists with the Eternal Guard deathstar and 40 Glade Guard (in 2 units of 20, because static combat res becomes important). Use Eagles and Wild/Glade riders to control the flow of the battle, and pick your targets for your Guards. Avoid combat as much as you can, and when you get into it make sure you have plenty of static combat resolution either from every possible source you can get it, to maximize damage to their units due to Daemonic Instability. Dwellers Below will definitely help, as will Curse of Anraheir and Amber Spear. Anything to squeak out more combat resolution (like some of the spites, or the war banner) is a good plan.
Hope this helps,
~gwh
Written by godswearhats
asrai.druchii.net/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=%2025906
This is (I hope) a comprehensive overview of the Daemons of Chaos army and how to defeat it. I will touch on all units, but focus heavily on those that I see in more competitive lists / at tournaments. The focus is on how to defeat these units with Wood Elves.
For chronological purposes, this is for 8th edition Warhammer, using 8th Edition Daemons book and 6th Edition Wood Elves book.
Overview
Daemons all have a 5++ Ward Save, magical attacks, cause Fear and are Unbreakable. Yes, all of those things. All units.
OK, now that's sunk in, let's look at the bright side. Being evil fiends and servants of the whimsical and tyrannical Chaos powers, they also have a form of Unstable. If they lose combat, instead of making a break test, they make a Leadership test with a modifier based on the combat result, and however many they fail by they lose that many extra wounds. However, on a roll of double-1, they get all the models back that they lost that round, and on a roll of double-6 the whole unit is sucked into the void. (These last two don't happen very often, so they aren't a big factor in the game).
Also, when they roll winds of magic each round, they have to consult a special table. Rolling low usually does something bad to units which follow one of the four gods, while rolling high usually does something good. Rolling very high (11-12) can enable them to put new units on the table, while conversely rolling 2-3 means they are likely to lose models.
Having Magical Attacks negates all our Forest Spirit ward saves, making most of those units a poor choice against Daemons. If I'm tailoring my list, I tend to take an all-elf list. In addition, with all units being Unbreakable, you have to really kill the unit in order to have any chance to win.
Each Daemon is a Daemon of one of the four gods: Slaanesh (lust), Khorne (blood), Nurgle (plague) or Tzeentch (change). Slaanesh and Khorne Daemons Hate each other, as do Nurgle/Tzeentch. Each Daemon also has an extra special rule. Slaanesh: Armour Piercing, Khorne: +1 S on the charge, Nurgle: -1 to hit them in close combat, Tzeentch: re-roll Ward Saves rolls of 1 (and wizards re-roll channeling rolls of 1).
Daemons can't take regular magic items. There will be no Dispel Scroll in a Daemon army. They can take magical banners, and they also get two special ways to get cool stuff. One is Daemonic Gifts and the other is Loci of Chaos. I'll cover Loci of Chaos under Heralds, but the common rules are that the Herald and the unit it is in gets a special rule, and the biggest Locus wins (there are three levels at different points costs - if there are two Heralds in a unit, the Loci don't stack).
Daemonic gifts come in 3 flavors - lesser, greater and exalted (or 25, 50 and 75 pts). At the start of the battle, these gifts are rolled on a table. They are all good. Any gift can be exchanged for a magic weapon of the same/less points, even after being rolled (this is about the only way Daemons can get any choice on magic items). Frequently this means the lesser gift turns into a Sword of Swift Slaying or Striking. There are also special weapons that are available depending on the god. They cannot exchange them for anything other than magical weapons though. The Exalted gifts can be exchanged for "Hellforged Artifacts". I'll cover those toward the end, as they are pretty special and army lists can be built around some of them. Examples of gifts include ASF, Impact Hits (D3), Multiple Wounds (2) at the low end, 2+ AS, Scaly Skin (5+), +2 A in the medium gifts, and +3 S or +2 T at the top end. Our only consolation is that they are random :-)
Daemons have the same lores as their Warriors of Chaos counterparts, but with a different lore attribute. All the attributes bring on more Daemon models when spells cause wounds. Daemonettes or Fiends for Slaanesh, Plaguebearers or Nurglings for Nurgle and Pink Horrors or Screamers for Tzeentch (it's easier for them to bring on the Core unit type, and they can only add to a unit within 12" of the caster).
The Army
Each of the gods has a Greater Daemon (Lord level) and a Herald (Hero level). All Greater Daemons have WS/S/T6 minimum, and W5 minimum. There are also a slew of special characters, but I'm only really going to go into detail about one of them (Epidimius) because he's the most common (and arguably the most broken). They are all powerful in different ways, and also expensive in terms of points. Each god also has a single Core unit, and units in Special and Rare.
Rather than go by army section, I'll go by god as you're more likely to see armies of one god (or two) than three or four. Inspiring Presence and Hold Your Ground only work if the character and the unit taking the Ld test are from the same god. There are a few units that can be taken in any army and turned into a Deamon of any god - I'll cover those at the end.
Slaanesh
Greater Daemon: Keeper of Secrets. Doesn't fly but has M10 anyway. As you might expect, it's no slouch in close combat. It is also usually a wizard (can be up to L4), and runs either lore of Slaanesh or Shadow. Like most monsters, Amber Spear / Dwellers are good options, however he/she has no armor save, so even long range Glade Guard fire is effective (assuming your opponent didn't roll some armor on the gifts table).
Herald: Can be mounted on a Steed of Slaanesh (Fast Cav, M10, 1 Poisoned Attack) or a chariot. The Loci here are pretty annoying. Lesser gives the ability to auto-pass any characteristic test (except Ld), dangerous terrain test or Look Out Sir! roll. This means that both Dwellers Below and Curse of Anraheir are useless. The Greater locus gives them ASF, and the exalted makes it such that if they issue a challenge, it can't be refused and they get to choose who accepts AND every model in base contact with the unit gets -3 to their Initiative. Solution: turn them into pincushions as their Toughness is low (3) and their armor save is non-existent. He/she/it can be a L1 wizard on Shadow or Slaanesh.
Core: Daemonettes are WS5 with 2 attacks, but only S/T 3. They are not tough, but are still unbreakable which sucks. Again, my normal reaction would be to throw Dryads at them, but the lack of Ward save for our Forest Spirits means that best case we'd do 4 wounds, take 4 wounds back and lose to static combat resolution. Eternal Guard is a fair fight, so if you have greater static combat res, you should win any fight against Daemonettes and grind them out. This doesn't hold true if they have ASF though, so be careful.
Special: Seekers are Daemonettes on the back of Steeds of Slaanesh. Being Unbreakable Fast Cav, you won't ever see the double flee. Fiends are Monstrous Beasts that give -1 WS and I to anything in base contact, and have the combat stats of a Dryad, but with 3W and 3A. Seeker Chariots (along with the Rare choice 'Exalted Seeker Chariot') are only S/T/W 4 with a 6+ AS, but they are M10 and the exalted does 2D6+1 impact hits (and has 8 wounds). A Herald can be mounted on one. Again, don't engage if you can avoid them, or attack from the rear or side for extra combat resolution. (This message is a common pattern throughout the tactica - it's about the only way to deal with Unbreakable units). The crew are only S3. If you treat Slaanesh daemons as daemonic elves, you'll get the right idea.
Rare: Apart from the Exalted chariot, they also have a Hellflayer, which sounds a lot worse than it is. It's another chariot, with a similar profile, but it gives +1 A to the main rider for every impact hit wound it causes.
Lore of Slaanesh: There are three spells in here that are worth discussing (the others are fairly straightforward). One is Acquiescence, a hex which gives the unit ASL and Random Movement D6. Now you can't flee or charge, which is a bit of a pain, and it's only a 6+ to cast. The second is Phantasmagoria, which makes you take a Ld test with an extra D6, and discard the lowest. The really bad part about this is the boosted version hits all enemy units within 24". When half the army causes Terror and the whole army causes Fear, this is pretty bad. The final one is Cacophonic Choir, which is the same as Acquiesence, plus 2D6 hits that wound on a 4+ with no AS AND it can be boosted to hit every enemy unit within 12". Keep an eye out for those two spells as they can wreck your day if he rolls well on the winds of magic.
Special characters: nothing to be scared of.
Khorne
Khorne is the god of blood, skulls, battle, etc. None of his Daemons can be wizards, and most (if not all) have Magic Resistance of some sort and the lowest WS is 5.
Greater Daemon: Bloodthirster. Flying, and very killy. This will kill pretty much anything in our army (including a Treeman) pretty handily. However, it only has a 5+/5++, so concentrated missile fire will kill it - 40 shots will do on average 2 wounds (it's T6), so try to get as much missile fire on it as you can. MR 2, so a little harder to kill with Amber Spear.
Herald: can be mounted on a Juggernaut (which makes it pretty badass monstrous cav - see Bloodcrushers) or on a Blood Throne (a very nasty chariot - see Skull Cannon). The Loci available to it are (in ascending order): Magic Resistance 2, Frenzy, Hatred. WS7 on a hero level character.
Core: Bloodletter. These used to be much scarier than they are, but they still have Scaly Skin 6, MR 1, and Killing Blow with WS5 and S4 (5 on the charge). They are only T3, so they fall to long-range bow-fire, but remember they are Unbreakable.
Special: Bloodcrushers. This is a Bloodletter mounted on a Juggernaut. They have a 4+ AS, S5, W3 and A3, so while they aren't the annoying 1+ AS Monstrous Cav of some armies, they can still be quite formidable. If the unit is large, redirect them. Otherwise, try to get flank/combo charges on them. They can get especially nasty if a Herald is in with them.Fleshhounds: Ambushing war beasts, with MR 3, 2A and 2W.
Rare: Skull Cannon: Expect to see two of these pretty regularly. Flaming, magical cannon on the back of a chariot that is no slouch in close combat. It can regain wounds (any of its impact hits that wound cause it to regain a wound on a 4+). This is the same Blood Throne chariot that a Herald can ride (it's unusual though). If he's on one, his Locus extends to all Khorne units within 6". The Skull Cannon are a priority to kill if you have any Treemen or Treekin on the board. Use your fast cav or Eagle / Eagle Noble to get behind or beside them and then charge (thus avoiding the chariot attacks).
Special characters: even more killy versions of their already killy stuff. Be aware that they have a Fleshhound special character - unusual to see a War Beast character of any sort. Their Hero level character, Skulltaker, will kill pretty much anything in a challenge (he gets HKB in a challenge), but he also can't refuse a challenge (in case that becomes useful). I generally just don't want to get into combat with any of their characters if I can avoid it.
Nurgle
Nurgle is probably the most powerful of the mono-god builds, and that's primarily because of Epidemius, Nurgle's Tallyman. He's a special character, and I'm going to start with him because if you see him on the battlefield, he is absolutely your number one priority to kill. Here's how he works. The Daemon player keeps account of all unsaved Wounds caused by Daemons of Nurgle or Nurgle spells. Then there's a table of cumulative bonuses that ALL Daemons of Nurgle get as the wound count rises. The table kicks in at every 7 wounds, starting with +1 S, then +1 T, then Killing Blow, then re-roll failed ward saves. It doesn't take very long to get to 14 Wounds, which in effect gives every Nurgle daemon a permanent Wyssan's Wildform. Annoyingly, Epidemius is on a Palanquin of Nurgle (a throne carried by Nurglings) which makes him Monstrous Cavalry. He's T5, with 4W (he gets SA at S5 and his throne gets 6A at S3) so be careful. The good news is that he usually runs in a unit of Plaguebearers, so he won't get a Look Out, Sir! although he does give his unit Poisoned Attacks that wound on a 5+ instead of a 6+.
OK, now that you've been warned, on to the rest of the Nurgle daemons. Nurgle, as mentioned is the god of plagues, disease and all sorts of other nastiness. The miniatures are super-gross.
Greater Daemon: Great Unclean One is T/W 7 with Poisoned Attacks, and can be up a L4 Wizard on either Nurgle or Death. You'll see both, because Death is arguably more powerful but Nurgle keeps Epidemius' tally higher (don't let your opponent tally wounds caused by Death). Again, no armor save and only M6, so stay as far away as possible and turn it into a pincushion. Even Flock of Doom can help with this guy. He commonly carries the Balesword which gives him Poisoned Attacks and Multiple Wounds (D3) ... yuck!
Herald: Epidemius is technically herald, but you'll see others as well. They can be L1 Wizards on Nurgle or Death. The lesser locus makes poisoned attacks wound on a 5+, the greater gives Regeneration and the Exalted gives an additional S4 hit if a poisoned attack rolls a 6 to hit. All of these are nasty. Heralds are S/T 5 but generally only have W2 unless they are mounted on a Palanquin like Epidemius.
Core: Plaguebearers are WS 3, S/T 4 with 1 attack. You'll get -1 to hit in close combat, which means you're still hitting on 4s no matter what. They aren't terribly threatening, but a unit of 10 will beat just about any other equivalent size unit we have in the long run, and the Poisoned Attacks mean that even Treemen aren't a good option. Shoot them, and get combo flank/rear charges as best you can.
Special: Beasts of Nurgle are arguably the best 60pt unit in the game. M6, S4, T5, W4 and D6+1 attacks, with poison and regeneration. They can also challenge as if they are characters and enemies get no bonus for flank/rear attacks. Like all Nurgle Daemons, they have low initiative, but you really can't kill them in one turn because they have such a small frontage (50mm). Either charge them and accept the casualties, avoid them, or shoot them. Try to avoid wasting time on them because they are so cheap you don't get many points for killing them. Nurglings are Swarms with Scout. 4W and 4A but only S/T3. These guys won't do much in combat, but they are annoying and will hold up units.
Rare: Plague Drones are Monstrous Cav with the Hover rule (just like Fly but can't March). They can be upgraded with a poisoned 12" shooting attack that does D3 wounds, and are T5 with 3 wounds. Avoid, shoot, combo charge.
Lore of Nurgle: This Lore sucks for us. A lot of the spells require you to pass a Toughness test or take a wound. In fact, Rancid Visitations does D6 S5 hits, and then repeatedly does D6 S5 hits until you pass a Toughness test. There's also a spell that will reduce Toughness by D3, and the signature spell is a flame template where everything underneath takes a wound if they fail the Toughness test. So yes, this lore sucks. Typically the main caster is either a Daemon Prince (see later) or a Greater Daemon, but if Epidemius is on the battlefield he's still your number one priority to kill, and the wizard can wait. Otherwise, kill the wizard quick.
Tzeentch
Tzeentch is probably the least popular of the four, partially because your Lore choices are Tzeentch (which is very random) and Metal, and partially because a lot of attacks have the Warpflame special rule. Anything that is wounded by an attack / spell with this special rule takes a Toughness test at the end of the phase and suffers D3 wounds if they fail, but gets Regeneration 6+ if they succeed. That weirdness puts a lot of players off. Also, Warpflame is not Flaming. Weird, huh?
Greater Daemon: Lord of Change is always at least a L2 wizard (Metal or Tzeentch). Other than that, he has the same abilities as all the other Greater Daemons. He's not very scary in comparison to some others. The Tzeentch magic item that is most popular is the Wand of Whimsy, which gets charged up on a D6 roll of 5+ after the bearer casts or dispels. For every charge, you get +1S and +1A.
Herald: Again, they are always wizards (at least L1) on Metal or Tzeentch. I'll explain the Lesser Locus under Pink Horrors below. The Greater Locus gives the Herald and unit Strength D6, rolled at the start of each turn (I've not seen this taken) and the Exalted gives +1 S to any spells cast by the Herald or any models in his unit. The Heralds are pretty crappy in combat, which is another reason people don't take them. They can be mounted on a Disc of Tzeentch, which is like being mounted on a crappy Great Eagle.
Core: Pink Horrors (who amusingly have a special rule called Blue Horrors (because there used to a unit with that name)) are the meager core offering for Tzeentch. These are easily the worst combat unit, but they count as a L1 Wizard of Tzeentch, with an additional +1 to cast for each rank they have (up to +3). They take 2D6 S10 hits on a miscast though :-) The Blue Horrors special rule is a strange one. For each Pink Horror that dies, put two counters beside the unit. Once combat is over, roll a D6 for each counter and on a 4+ the opposing unit takes a S2 hit. Any wounds count toward combat resolution. The lesser locus means you put D3+1 of these counters instead. So, while they are easy to kill in combat, there's a good chance that they'll take a couple more elves with them, and in a unit of 20 can be a really annoying grinding unit (especially as they get to replenish themselves due to the Lore attribute).
Special: Flamers of Tzeentch are supporting fire - Multiple Shots D6, range 18" S4, unit size 3-6. These guys can really mess up an elf unit, but again aren't seen a lot because they have Warpflame and there are so many other choices. Screamers are a type of War Beast that can fly and do Multiple Wounds (D3) against Large Targets in close combat and D3 S4 attacks on a unit that they've flown over in the Remaining Moves phase.
Rare: Burning Chariots of Tzeentch are T4 chariots with no armor save that has random strength (D6) Warpflame shooting attacks. I don't know why anyone would ever take one of these, and this really is the nail on the Tzeentch coffin.
Lore of Tzeentch: There are no augments in this Lore - it's pretty much all direct damage and magic missiles, and the Strength is almost always random (D6). Expect people to take Metal on their Tzeentch wizards where possible. The only standout spell is one that targets an enemy wizard - both wizards roll a D6 and add their Level, and if the enemy loses, he takes a wound, loses a wizard level, and a random spell which the Tzeentch wizard gains. This Lore makes me mildly concerned that the rewritten Lore of Athel Loren will remain sub-par :-(
Special Characters: You don't see them much, but they're basically all spellcasters with some special abilities. Just ask your opponent about their special rules, as none of them are particularly scary or game changing. My buddy is going to start playing a lot with Kairos Fateweaver. He gets to more or less choose 8 spells from the Battle Lores as well as knowing all Tzeentch spells. He also allows a re-roll of a single D6 per turn. So he can cast some Death spells to generate extra power dice, and then throw a giant Fireball or whatever. Seems like it might be good, but I reserve judgment until I see him in action.
Unaligned Daemons
These are the Daemon models that are neutral or can be upgraded to be a Daemon of any particular god, and so are equally likely to appear in any army.
Chaos Furies are a special choice. They are a flying chaff unit, similar to Harpies. They serve no other real purpose.
Daemon Prince is a Lord choice that has all the same ridiculous stats as his WoC counterpart. The big difference is that he does not have access to magic items in the same way, and so can't get the 1+ AS etc. Typically this model will be the general, an L4 wizard, will have 4+ AS, Fly and 75 points of Daemonic Gifts. He's a lot easier to kill because of the AS, and at T5, concentrated Glade Guard shooting will kill it pretty quickly. He must select one of the four gods and so will have their ability as mentioned at the top.
Soul Grinder is a Monster with M8, S6 and T7 who must select one of the four gods to follow. Watch out if this is in a Nurgle army with Epidemius. He comes with a grapeshot-only cannon by default, but he can upgrade that to fire thrower, bolt thrower or stone thrower, all of which can be fired even if he moves. He also has a special rule whereby he can pick a model in close combat and grab it with his claw - if the model fails an intiative test it gets grabbed. A grabbed model is hit automatically with all four attacks. There's a final upgrade called the Daemonbone Claw which means the Soul Grinder can trade all his attacks for a single S10, D6 wounds attack instead - these two in combo mean a very dead Treeman in all likelihood. This guy is hard to kill but can be avoided due to his sheer size. He's only WS3, so if you have someone on WS7 who can't be stomped, you'll likely be able to kill it. At Ld 7, you could even risk the Spirit Sword ;-)
Hellforged Artifacts
I wanted to talk about three of these in particular, because they can be a bit of surprise if you don't know they exist.
The Portalglyph allows a unit to be kept in the Realm of Chaos, and placed within 12" (+3d6" scatter) of the bearer. It's not a huge shocker, because first he has to drop the Portalglyph, and the unit can come in on any subsequent turn. Still, it means that it can be quite easy to get a big unit in behind your back lines on Turn 3.
The Rock of Inevitability drops a Cursed Bulwark up to 8" long in front of the bearer (one use only). Then every turn after that, roll a D6. 1-3 does nothing, 4-5 adds another Bulwark and 6 adds a Watchtower (they must all be continuous). Wood Elves (and other forces of order) are at -2 initiative when in base contact. This can really mess with our shooting too, giving hard cover to units that otherwise looked vulnerable.
The Chromatic Tome allows the Chaos player to re-roll the Winds of Magic. If he does, you get to re-roll them in your phase too. This can lead to very magic heavy games, and also allows your opponent to be more likely to avoid bad affects on the table that I mentioned earlier. This makes it even more critical to keep your wizard alive and kill theirs.
Summary
Daemons are a horrible matchup for anyone because they are Unbreakable, but particularly bad for us because they negate all Forest Spirit wards and we generally have terrible static combat resolution. The best successes I've had have come from running all-elf lists with the Eternal Guard deathstar and 40 Glade Guard (in 2 units of 20, because static combat res becomes important). Use Eagles and Wild/Glade riders to control the flow of the battle, and pick your targets for your Guards. Avoid combat as much as you can, and when you get into it make sure you have plenty of static combat resolution either from every possible source you can get it, to maximize damage to their units due to Daemonic Instability. Dwellers Below will definitely help, as will Curse of Anraheir and Amber Spear. Anything to squeak out more combat resolution (like some of the spites, or the war banner) is a good plan.
Hope this helps,
~gwh