The Chaos Daemon army is not quite like other armies in the Warhammer 40k universe. This is because the Chaos Daemon army was designed for the Warhammer Fantasy game ( now replaced by Age of Sigmar  ) and ported across to 40k.

The Chaos Daemon army plays quite differently to other 40k armies. This is mainly due to the numerous special rules. The addition of these rules also make the army difficult to play. I would suggest that the Daemon army is not a good one for beginners, but a great one for advanced payers that fancy a challenge!

General Chaos Daemon Tactics

Often the best was to use the Chaos Daemon army is to use it as an attachment to a Warhammer Chaos Marine army. What the Chaos Daemon units bring to the Chaos Marine is psychic powers, monstrous creatures and close combat units. The number of deep striking units are useful for snatching objectives or take out key enemy units.

Chaos Daemons come in five flavours one for each of the chaos gods and one faction for those that do not follow a specific chaos god, or follow all of them equally.

Chaos Daemon Special Rules

The Chaos Daemon army come with a number of special rules. These rules are quite different from other Warhammer 40k armies.

The Four Gods of Chaos and Chaos Undivided

If you are familiar with the Chaos Space Marines you will have come across the four chaos gods; Khorne, Slannesh, Nurgle, and Tzeench. With the Chaos Marine army the use the chaos god’s traits is optional. There are enough unaligned choices available to create a undivided army. With the Chaos Daemon army you will need to be totally conversant with the chaos gods traits.

Each of these four gods have their own characteristics. These characteristic are passed on to the gods followers.

Chaos God Khorne

Khorne is the most popular chaos god with players. Khorne is the god of war and the Daemons of Khorne are frenzied close combat killers. The other aspect of Khorne, and it’s followers is that there are no Khorne psykers.

Khorne units work well with Tzeench units. The Tzeench can provide psychic long range fire support that Khorn units are usually short of.

Chaos God Nurgle

Nurgle units are the second most popular chaos units. Nurgle specializes in diseases and poisons. The Nurgle units tend to be tough but a bit slower than  other units.

Nurgle units work well with Slaanesh units that have the speed that the Nurgle units don’t have.

Chaos God Slaanesh

Slaanesh units are focused of speed and the excess of pleasure. This means that they are fast but fragile. Slaanesh units also have access to a number of psychoactive drugs and narcotics.

Slaanesh units work well with Nurgle units that have the toughness that the Slaanesh units don’t have.

Chaos God Tzeench

Tzeench is the god of change and is the master of psychic powers. The downside though is that Tzeench units are generally poor at close combat.

Tzeench units work well with Khorne units that can act as body guards to the more vulnerable Tzeench units.

Chaos Daemon HQ Tactics

The Chaos Daemon army has a wide verity of HQ choices. Some of these are very powerful and some are quite quirky, however they all come with a slew of special rules. I highly recommend that you know the special rules for any unit you take, maybe writing out the special rules on a 3×4 card so you can have as a prompt while you play.

Chaos Daemon Warlord Traits

Chaos Daemon warlords can use the default Warlord Traits found in the rule book, or the warlord traits found in the Chaos Daemon’s codex. One the whole the codex warlord traits are recommended. This is specially true if the bulk of your force is from the Chaos Daemon Codex.

• Skarbrand
• Kairos Fateweaver
• Ku’Gath Plaguefather
• Bloodthirster
• Lord of Change
• Great Unclean One
• Keeper Of Secrets

Daemon Prince

The Daemon Prince can come in a verity of configurations. If you get a chance have a look at the options available before you build the model. This will give you the chance to configure the model to fit in with your play style. You can see from the attached image that I prefer to have my Daemon Prince with wings. This allows him to deep strike and zp around the table using the maximum damage.

• Heralds Of Chaos
• Skulltakers
• Karanak
• Herald of Khorne
• The Changeling
• The Blue Scribes
• Herald Of Tzeentch
• Epidemius
• Hearld Of Nurgle
• The Masque Of Slaanesh
• Hearald of Slanesh

Exalted Flamer of Tzeentch

The Exalted Flamer of Tzeentch is a cheap HQ choice for a daemon army. This means that you do not get a powerful leader, but you do get points to spend on the rest of the army. This specially important in low point games.

Chaos Daemon Troop Tactics

• Bloodletters Of Khorne
• Pink  Horrors of Tzeentch
• Plaguebearers
• Daemonettes Of Slaanesh
• Nurglings

Chaos Daemon Elite Tactics

• Bloodcrushers Of Khorne
• Flamers Of Tzeentch
• Beast Of Nurgle
• Fiends Of Slaanesh
• Chaos Daemon Fast Attack Tactics
• Flesh Hounds Of Khorne
• Screamers Of Tzeentch
• Plague Drone Of Nurgle
• Seekers Of Slaanesh
• Hellflayer Of Slaanesh + Exalted Alluress

Chaos Daemon Heavy Support Tactics

Soul Grinder

Where as most of the Chaos Daemon army was transported from the Fantasy Battles game in to 40k, the Soul Grinder was designed for 40k and been graphed in to Fantasy Battles and Age of Sigmar. Because of this the Soul Grinder may be the most familiar of the Chaos Daemon choices to an existing 40k player.

The Soul Grinder is a walker usually armed with both close combat weapons and ranged weapons.

Soul Grinder Strengths and Weapons

The default weapons that the Soul Grinder comes with is an ‘Iron Claw’ power fist and a Harvester Cannon.

Other Chaos Daemon Heavy Support Options

• Skull Cannon Of Khorne
• Burning Chariot Of Tzeench
• Seeker Cavalcade
• Seeker Chariot Of Slaanesh
• Exalted Seeker Chariot Of Slaanesh