My first 1000pt Khorne Daemonkin game!

So, last night I fielded 2 Bloodthirsters, 2 Soul Grinders with Phlegm, and 2 squads of Bloodletters (each with a Bloodreaper). I went up against an Eldar army: an Avatar, a Farseer, a Wraithlord, a squad of Dire Avengers, a squad of Jetbikes with a Warlock, a squad of Swooping Hawks, and a Wave Serpent.

The centre of the table was dominated by a ruined church on my right flank, with a few towers on the left. There were ruins in our deployment zones as well.

The Eldar deployed first, mostly opposite the left/centre but with the Hawks and Jetbikes on my right. I put my Soulgrinders, the Warlord Thirster, and 1 squad of Letters on the left/centre, the other Thirster off on the right. This was a mistake, I should have kept them together. But it was hard, with all the ruins in my deployment zone.

Basically I ploughed forward, shooting off Phlegm (which scattered wildly and did nothing). The pointy ears blasted away, knocking off some wounds & hull points from Thirsters and Grinders. The Thirster on the right was whittled away by the hawks and jetbikes, never reaching them before falling. The second Letters squad appeared over on the right by the Jetbikes, but was blown away by them.

On the left a Soulgrinder charged the Avatar, and got smashed out of existence in return. The Avatar then charged the other Soulgrinder. My Thirster piled into his Avatar to save the Grinder, whilst the Letters moshed into the Dire Avengers, both with the Blood Tithe giving them Rage. The Letters did well, leaving only 1 Avenger standing; and the Avatar & Thirster began knocking each other about. Because the Thirster had to challenge the Avatar, the Grinder did nothing (whoops).

Then the Avatar turned invisible, the Wraithlord charged the Letters, and the Farseer & Swooping Hawks charged the Grinder. My Thirster suddenly found it very hard to hit the Avatar, my Soul Grinder was going down, and my Letters were fighting someone that they couldn't hurt and couldn't run away from...

At this point the Blood Tithe began to be useful. I managed to get enough points to bring in a new Bloodletter pack, who promptly Mishapped and were placed by my opponent into a shooting alley. And were blown apart. Killing them and the Wraithlord finishing my other squad got me enough Tithes to bring in a new new Bloodletter pack, who again mishapped into the shooting alley.

And then my Warlord Thirster finally fell, with enough wounds on him to carry over into the Grinder. I was deaded.

Khorne was pleased! Lots of blood!

I made mistakes. I shouldn't have left a Thirster all on his own on the right flank. I should have sent the Thirster against the Wraithlord, not the Avatar as that left my Grinder useless. But hey, it's one of my first games since 5th ed, I'm still getting back into the swing of things.

In the future, I want to have more people with 3+ saves. My daemons disappeared scarily fast when he started shooting, especially with the Warlock using Sanctic powers to reduce my invulnerable save. The Slaughtercult formation giving me more Blood Tithe points would be very good as well, that's one to look into. And some small sacrificial squads, there to win Blood Tithe by dying.

Possible 1,500pts:
Slaughtercult
Bloodthirster: 250pts
Possessed: 150pts
Chaos Marines: 130pts
Chaos Marines: 130pts
Cultists: 58pts
Spawn: 38pts
Lord of Slaughter
Bloodthirster: 250pts
War Engines
Soul Grinder, Phelgm: 165pts
Soul Grinder, Phelgm: 165pts
Soul Grinder, Phelgm: 165pts

Khorne Daemonkin thoughts & sample lists

So, Codex: Khorne Daemonkin? I love it! Basically, it contains every unit that I wanted to use from Codex: Chaos Daemons. Plus lots of other units from Chaos Space Marines. What's not to like? When you look at it from the perspective of a Khorne Daemon player, these are the key changes:

• Daemonic Instability is replaced by Fearless.
• There's no Warp Storm table. This is a bit of a pity, I did like the fun randomness, even if it bit me as often as it helped me.
• You can't buy Daemonic Rewards any more. Again, this codex is about making a more predictable and less random army.
• No Daemonic Rewards means no Grimoire, no Portaglyph! I didn't use them, but I know people who did will be sad.
• If a character is in close combat, they must challenge. This is nice and fluffy.
• Now a big addition... Blood Tithes. For every unit you kill, for every unit you loose, for every character you kill in challenges, and for every character of yours who dies (possibly just in challenges), you get a Blood Tithe point. And points mean prizes - this system is about giving you the ability to get some nasty special rules, and to summon!
• As with regular summoning, note that it's stupid summoning Bloodthirsters or winged Daemon Princes late in the game. They arrive from Deep Strike, so are flying high. In the turn after they arrive they can come down low, but can't charge until 2 turns after they arrive. So if you're summoning, summon infantry. Non-flying Daemon Princes are good, but I think that Bloodcrushers will be my favourites (especially as they come with a champ, instrument, and the banner of more reliable charge range).
• And the other big addition: we now have access to loads of CSM options in our army. Cultists for lower cost troops, lots of 3+ saves, daemon engines like Maulerfiends, and transport vehicles. Heralds with loci can join these guys, so a massive mob of Cultists with a locus is a possibility, as are Berserkers or Possessed with a locus.
• Bloodletter minimum squad size is down to 8, so they're 80 pts base not 100. It's not a massive change, but I like it.
• Instead of going CAD or Unbound there are formations, including the Formation of Formations which if you follow that gives you a free Blood Tithe point each turn. Nice. This also gives you the option of taking 8 war engines in a bound army. 8 Soulgrinders!
• We have 2 new types of Bloodthirster! Obviously Chaos Daemons get these now too, thanks to the White Dwarf, but thought I'd mention them.
• We have 6 new mission objectives. They mostly revolve around killing stuff, so play to our strengths!

So, that's the key things. The best way to make an army, particularly at higher points costs, will definitely be to use the uberformation. Sadly that requires Possessed, and I haven't build any of them yet. So today's 1000pts list is instead using the CAD:
HQ: Bloodthirster of Unfettered Fury - 250pts
HQ: Bloodthirster of Unfettered Fury - 250pts
Troops: 8 Bloodletters, champ - 85pts
Troops: 8 Bloodletters, champ - 85pts
Heavy: Soulgrinder, big gun - 165pts
Heavy: Soulgrinder, big gun - 165pts

The Soulgrinders will blow stuff up to gain Blood Tithes and hopefully draw some fire. The Bloodthirsters will hurry forward to reap some skulls. The Bloodletters will run around picking up objectives.

Note that this list wouldn't work with Chaos Daemons, I'm utilising the smaller cheaper Bloodletter squads of this new codex.

Quite frankly, even if I'd made my Possessed I'm not sure that I'd want to swap a Soulgrinder for Possessed and 1 more Blood Tithe point a turn. But to expand to 1,500pts I'll definitely do that, maybe something like:
The above list - 1000pts
Possessed - 150pts
Soulgrinder, big gun - 165pts
Soulgrinder, big gun - 165pts
A few upgrades to Possessed or Bloodletters - 20pts

Or maybe switch a Soulgrinder for some Cultists and/or Spawn, cheap units that will give me Blood Tithe points when they die?