Editing Warhammer 40,000/9th Edition Tactics/Death Guard (section)

===Elites===
===={{W40Kkeyword|Infantry Character}}s====
*'''[[Biologus Putrifier]]''' - Same stats as the Foul Blightspawn. He's only got a plague knife for melee, and his shooting leaves much to be desired - sure, his Injector Pistol is S4 AP-1 D1 and deals 1d3 mortal wounds when it wounds {{WH40Kkeyword|Beasts/Cavalry/Infantry}}, but it has a pathetic 3" range. It's his grenades that make him worth it: his Hyper Blight Grenades are AP-1 and deal 2 damage, and any other friendly Death Guard units within 6" get their blight grenades upgraded in the same way. As an added bonus, when killed he explodes like a vehicle on a 4+, inflicting a mortal wound on any non-{{WH40Kkeyword|NURGLE}} units within 7" of him.  He also buffs your melee: 1/turn at the start of your charge or any fight phase, pick a friendly {{WH40Kkeyword|<plague company> core}} unit within 6" - until your next command phase, that unit's melee attacks with Plague Weapons deal 1 mortal wound on nat 6s to wound.
**This also goes very well with the Blightening strat that lets a unit throw 21.5 blight grenade attacks.
***Also, while the "ass load of grenades" stratagem is great, you don't necessarily have to do this all the time. Each unit can throw one grenade (3.5 grenade attacks) and the dozens of HQ characters and mini Elite slot characters that DG armies will no doubt end up running can each throw a blight grenade. So the bulk of your army may well be able to throw half a dozen grenades in a single shooting phase without even using a stratagem.
**Because his only aura is his Blight Grenade improver you can have him take actions like Raise the Banners or Spread the Sicknesss without much issue. 
*'''[[Foul Blightspawn]]''' - 75 points, M5″ A3 S4 WS/BS3+ T5 W4 Sv3+ Ld 8. His weapon, the Plaguesprayer, is a 12" Assault 1d6 S7 AP-3 D2 Plague Weapon that autohits like a flamer, which means that it's good enough to deal with MEQs to vehicles. The Unholy Death's Head grenade is cute and has blast. Maybe if he's close to an 11+ squad he can drop 12 shots on something, but his sprayer is way better in most cases, including against units of size 6=10. He's terrible in assault personally since he has no melee weapon, but you want him in the frontlines by the assaults due to his ability to make a unit within 3" fight last. For glass cannon melee units that rely on being the first to strike in the Fight phase to compensate for their poor durability (like Daemonettes, Howling Banshees, and Emperor's Children Chaos Space Marines), this can leave them defenseless at the worst possible time. This also doubles as a bit of cross-god synergy: send a Blightspawn in with some Slaaneshi daemons or Emperor's Children marines, and you'll ensure that they ''always'' Fight First, for real this time. You will often want to give this guy a Deadly Pathogen, usually Viscous Death (if you're concerned you won't face vehicles) or Corrosive Filth (if you're confident you will).
*'''[[Noxious Blightbringer]]''' - A debuff machine with a plasma pistol, Disgustingly Resilient, a cursed plague bell (D2 poisoned close combat weapon), and blight grenades. This guy got the short end of the stick when compared to his other Foetid Virion buddies. He has three abilities but you'll probably only take him for his aura of +1 to move and advance to make your infantry faster. His other auras are nice... if they weren't 6 inch range. A Psyker can just move out of the 6 inch range to avoid the -1 to casting aura and then cast from 7 inches away.  Maybe they'll see play in a Ferryman plague company, then use the strat to pick and choose which ability you need. He does have a nice relic that stops units from falling back and can be really good in the right match-up, but then he's competing with other characters and better relics. 
*'''[[Plague Surgeon]]''' - Dr. pimple popper. It's ironic that out of all the Traitor Legions, it was the Death Guard of all people that kept their [[Apothecary|Apothecaries]]. Like their Loyalist counterparts, they're mainly intended for support, but instead of reviving dead units, they give a 6+++ to {{W40Kkeyword|Bubonic Astartes Infantry}} units within 3" of them, giving back some of the old DR from 8ed, and can pick one such unit to heal for 1d3 wounds, which is great for healing a wounded Chaos Lord who has just finished fighting, or a terminator unit. He carries a Balesword (a Plague Weapon equivalent of a Power Sword), so he can actually hold his own in close combat with the right support.
** Keep in mind that his abilities are not tied to Plague Company only, so you can mix and match Plague Companies and let him heal everyone regardless of detachment. 
** Math wise Herr Doktor performs very poorly with basic bitch plague marines, because their wounds are "worth" 10.5 points each and he costs 75, i.e. he breaks even in points when he's prevented 7 and 1/7 wounds from being lost, either from healing (which is hard - the Marines can't be healed at 2 or 0 wounds, so you need to have specifically ended up with 1 injured member, and he can't dish out his total healing, only 1 wound of it) or from his FNP, which alone needs to have 42.86 points of damage come in to break even, on average (so if 43 come in, you should usually block enough to make a negligible points profit). Losing half a full squad of plague marines a turn for four-five turns without losing the whole unit shouldn't ever happen. That being said, it’s a lot easier to get value from healing terminators and characters, making him pretty good in Terminus Est where Outbreak Assault lets you deep strike with said terminators. 
***By the same logic, he needs to have 33.75 damage come at Blightlords or 27 at Deathshrouds to break even.  
***TL;DR: The best use for a plague surgeon is a survival boost for a unit or two of terminators inside a terminus est force.
*'''[[Tallymen|Tallyman]]''' - The mortal version of a Spoilpox Scrivener and Epidemius. A cheap (70) Dark Apostle-like unit that allows one friendly {{W40Kkeyword|<plague company> core}} within 6" of him to get +1 to hit rolls (both melee and ranged); since he only has a plasma pistol and grenades he should probably be kept out of melee himself. His other, odder gimmick is called Seven-fold Chant - every turn with a Tallyman in your Battle-Forged army, roll 2d6; on a 7+, you get a CP at the beginning of the command phase. Interestingly enough. this works for not only your own phase but your opponent's as well. The more players in a game the more opportunities to get back CP. His relic gives an aura of additional hits on 6+ for shooting to  {{W40Kkeyword|<plague company> core}}, further discouraging you from ever taking a Sigil of Decay on your plague marines (that's the upgrade where your bolters auto-wound on 6 to hit; if you combine both abilities, on a 6 to hit you get an autohit that needs to wound and a normal hit that autowounds, i.e. the Sigil won't buff the autohits the relic generates).
**Only the relic gives him an aura, so that’s the only thing you lose if you have him take actions like Raise the Banners or Spread the Sicknesss.

===={{W40Kkeyword|Infantry}} Squads====

*'''[[Blightlord Terminator|Blightlord Terminators]]''': While the Deathshroud are best suited to acting as a bodyguard and heavy melee unit, the Blightlords act more like classic Chaos Terminators with a few Nurglite twists. Like the Deathshroud, they've got Cataphractii armour with all the benefits that brings them. While they don't get Manreapers, they can equip just about anything else a Plague Marine can use, as well as Reaper Autocannons, allowing them to fill any kind of niche. 9th edition brought some changes for these boys: Plague Spewers can now be taken 1 per 5 models in addition to 1 per 5 Blight Launchers or Reaper Autocannons. Combi-weapon spam is now no longer possible, as you can only have up to 1 per 5 of each combi-flamer/melta/plasmas. The positive is that all of the weapon choices are now quite cheap.
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*'''Bubotic Axe:''' S+2 Ap-2 D1, Plague Weapon. Courtesy of Nurgle's gift, these will wound almost everything on a 2+ with rerolls of 1. Mathematically identical to the Balesword against MEQ's (gaining +1 to wound at a cost of -1ap) and GEQ's, the axes have an advantage against T7, anything with toughness 4+ and 4+ armour or worse, and anything with a decent invuln.
*'''Balesword:''' S+1 AP-3 D1, Plague Weapon. Identical to the axe against MEQ's and GEQ's, gains an advantage against low toughness, high armour targets (without decent invulns, so many t3 characters are out) like sisters or aspect warriors. 
*'''Flail of Corruption:''' Doubles your attack output (and your base A is 3, which is quite scary) with S+1 AP-2 D2, pretty much the best melee weapon you can grab, although it does replace your combi-bolter, unlike the other options, so only take if you know your Blightlords will be in melee. Alas it does not spill excess wounds anymore <strike> but we now have a stratagem to put this bad boy to good use </strike> . On average dice you're killing an extra 2.5 guardsmen, per flail (max 2), for 2cp. No.
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<tab name="Ranged Weapons">
*'''Blight Launcher:''' Effectively a short-range blaster with 24" Assault 2 S6 AP-2 D2 and Plague Weapon, meaning you can fire in any circumstance and it can blow out anything MEQ. Probably just a bit weaker than the reaper autocannon in general but why not take both?
*'''Reaper Autocannon:'''Our longest range infantry weapon. With 36" Heavy 4 S7 AP-2 D1 you will ruin many an infantryman's day and with some luck even shred light vehicles. All things considered, between this and the blight launcher, a foot slogging squad of deathshrouds is not such a bad idea.
*'''Plague Spewer:''' The Heavy Flamer of to the Plague Belcher's Flamer. The issue here is that it's not gaining anything from Inorexable Advance since it auto-hits and it won't fire if you advance. If you mean to deepstrike your blightlords then absolutely grab one of those, you will not regret it.
*'''Combi Plasma:''' Remains stronger on most accounts compared to the blight launcher if you overcharge it. However, the changes to Gets Hot alongside the lack of Plague Weapon does hurt the odds of ever taking this unless you absolutely need to blast marines. If you don't overcharge it then a plague launcher is straight up better most of the time. I would suggest to never fire both profiles at once, it almost never is worth it.
*'''Combi Melta:''' Deepstrike and then say goodbye to that wreckage. What wreckage? *FWAAAAMP* That wreckage. Same thing as the combiplasma regarding the double fire but even more so since you are using this mostly to shoot at big stuff. Alternate take - This wont be at under half range on the turn you Deepstrike, and if you do Deepstrike you'll want to make it into combat ASAP instead of standing around taking potshots with a melta. Reasonable if you've got 5pts spare, but don't expect the world... Or wreckage, unless the opponent runs a lot of 3W vehicles.
*'''Combi Flamer''' Strictly worse than the plague spewer but if you really need more flames then go for it.
*'''Combi Bolter''' last but not exactly least we have the "totally not a storm bolter but for chaos". Can always double-tap and will shred light infantry, but will struggle against anything remotely protected. 
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*'''[[Deathshroud|Deathshroud Terminators]]''': A returning favourite from the Death Guard's 30k version, and still a potent bodyguard after 10,000 years. They can deep strike. Between their 2+/4++, their ability to mask W9 or less Death Guard Characters within 3" from snipers, Disgustingly Resilient, and having three wounds, they're practically a requirement for keeping your Warlord as indestructible as possible. In battle, they're no slouches themselves, thanks to their Manreapers and Plaguespurt Gauntlets (a Hand Flamer, but a plague weapon, and if you take their Chimes of Contagion, once they reach max contagion range, targets will be down a point of toughness). They cost 50 base. Their scythes have either a Power fist profile (S8 AP-3 D2 but -1 to hit) or a more ex-scything one with double attacks but weaker.
**A Deathshroud champion is an excellent carrier of the Virulent Fever pathogen - put it on one of his plaguespurt gauntlets, then keep him within an Arch-Contaminator aura so you can re-roll all wounds that aren't sixes, even successful ones. 
**Alternative Opinion: Put Virulent Fever on his scythe, and that's 10 attacks in melee (8.33 will hit) looking for mortals instead of the risky d6 (3.5) shots of the gauntlet.   The only downside is needing to get into melee first.
*'''Possessed''': Possessed had a rough time in 8th edition. They were widely seen as unplayable for a long time before the ability to stack multiple buffs led to the inception of the dreaded "possessed bomb," an un-targetable nightmare of a deathstar. Such days are long past, and Death Guard Possessed finally seem to have found something of a middle ground as a fast, CORE, dedicated melee unit. Thanks to their Daemon save, they are slightly tougher than a normal Plague Marine, while enjoying the same range of defensive benefits. No longer burdened by a mediocre D3 attacks, they benefit from a flat 4 attacks at strength 5, ap -2. As an added bonus, they now count as having a Plague Weapon, unlocking many new combos to be explored. Finally, their 7-inch move makes them the fastest infantry unit in a traditionally slow army.
**Possessed boosted by a Noxious Blightbringer's Sickening Vitality Aura (+1 to movement and advance) can have a surprisingly effective range on the first turn. Being able to move 10-15 inches and get on top of an objective can be worth it in the right circumstances.
**If Possessed have one major flaw, it is the change to make them have the same transport limitations as Terminators. This prevents them from riding in rhinos and, barring land raiders, means you will likely be footslogging them across the battlefield.
**Note: while they can still benefit from being near a Herald of Nurgle, doing so will turn off your Contagions of Nurgle ability.
*'''Gellerpox Infected:''' Kill Team Annual 2022 brought back these zombie mutants as a special unit available only to the Death Guard and other Nurgle-aligned marine detachments as not-quite Agents of Chaos. This unit in particular is split between the S4 T4 mutants with frags and AP-1 melee weapons and the three Nightmare Hulks, each toting S5 and 5 wounds and wielding even meaner melee weapons, with one of them also getting an S4 AP-1 gut-flamer as well. This alongside the old 5+ FNP save makes these guys a touch more effective than the poxwalkers, but those zombies are far more numerous. However, the Elites Slot has always been rather overcrowded for Chaos, and the Foetid Virions being Elites does not help in any detachments outside of the Arks of Omen.
**'''Mutoid Vermin:''' The hordes of chittering insects and cyber-Nurglings are their own separate unit, but they won't take up a slot if you also took the Gellerpox. Naturally, these swarms are utterly pathetic and only get a 6+ save and 6+ FNP to protect them, but you can resurrect d3 of the buggers each Command phase, making them more of a hassle to get rid of.

===={{W40Kkeyword|Vehicle}}s====
*'''[[Helbrute]]''': You know it, you love it. These are your Dreadnought equivalents and you can kit them to just about anything, but between inexorable advance and their weapon options, you're probably going to go ranged. 7 Power Level because of course we needed another number 7. By default, it comes with a fist and a multi melta. The melta can be swapped for a variety of ranged weapons including twin heavy bolters for horde munching, reaper autocannons for threatening tougher stuff at a distance, plasma cannons that are always overcharged, and for long-range anti-tank, it's your best source of lascannons and missile launchers. Alternately the gun arm can become a second fist arm, adding 1 to the number of attacks it can make (note: due to all units being "equipped" with their unarmed attack per the core rules, this fist is unnecessary according to RAW) and comes with an underslung combi bolter that you can upgrade to a heavy flamer. Meanwhile the fist arm can be swapped for a missile launcher or a mix of melee weapons including a hammer which, compared to the fist loses its underslung gun and takes a -1 to hit penalty, but has 1 more AP and rolls D6 for damage, but since it has the same strength you shouldn't bother, the fists will be more consistent. Another melee option is the power scourge which makes three attacks on its own even if you make all your other attacks with a different weapon and hits like an overcharged plasma with 1 less AP. While Helbrutes can be nasty in melee, you're really going to want to kit them for range because lascannons and missile launchers are some of the longest range weapons this army has, and the Helbrute can have both for less than 150 points. In case Helbrutes weren't great enough to take just with their wargear, they also can fire on the move without penalty, have a stratagem that lets them add 1 to their hit and wound rolls if they only target a single enemy, <s>and every phase in which they take damage they roll a D6 and on a 6 they get a free round of shooting attacks if they're not in combat, or melee attacks if they are</s>. Never leave home without one, and consider taking more. As of CA2019, they cost 12 points less and have lost Hateful Assault in favour of more base attacks, and they have still not fixed the rule that makes the second fist unnecessary.
** Alternate opinion: Even though it seems to be great, you might want to not take them after all. Twin lascannon and missile launcher are good anti-tank weapons, but not for us, we are not gunline army. 3 shots hitting everything on 3s and wounding most enemy vehicles on 3+ isn't that great after all, and you can't really modify the outcome in any reliable way. You might get lucky and shoot down a Leman Russ in 1 turn, or you might not do anything at all for the entire game (or those 2 rounds that Helbrute lasts for). ~~Not having Disgustingly Resilient~~ and an invulnerable save makes you very fragile, and this is exactly what you shouldn't be as Death Guard.They have their own version of DR just by another name and it functions just like DR.
**Alternate Alternate opinion: With Helbrutes being included in the {{W40Kkeyword|CORE}} category they will benefit from our Lord's reroll 1 auras along with a variety of other buffs, including Sickly Corrosion effective turning their whole gun kit into a plague weapon. Their overall synergy both from range and melee has improved with a variety of options to really create a piece that can cover your weaknesses (which is usually firepower).
***Alternate opinion 3: Another consideration is that the helbrute profile doesn't degrade as he takes wounds. In fact after the 1st wound he gets better at his job. The tallyman relic affects him as he is in the {{W40Kkeyword|CORE}} category. 
*'''[[Decimator]]:<sup>Forge World</sup>''': The Decimator has essentially become an oddball Helbrute, It's weaker in melee against everything T5 and above (despite the extra attack) while better against everything T4 and lower, it's sort of better at range in that it has fantastic options. As a Daemon Engine, it can spend CP to re-roll its to hits and wounds. Meanwhile, the Soulburner petard is a downright fantastic anti-everything weapon, and even the Mortal Wounds it causes to the Decimator aren't a concern since it can just naturally heal those off. You can even take two since you can only hurt yourself once per gun. The Butcher Cannons meant more for offensive lists as debuffing an enemy unit before engaging in them Melee can be much more valuable than just shooting them again. With a 5++ it should live long enough to affect the later turns of a game. Recommended that you skip the C-beam cannon though as the arm slot is better spent on another weapon. In short, take Decimators if you need Mortal Wounds, and durability without Warpsmiths/Hellwrights following them around, get Helbrutes for everything else.
*'''[[Chaos Dreadnought#Chaos Contemptor Dreadnought|Chaos Contemptor Dreadnought]]<sup>Forge World [Martial Legacy]</sup>''': The Contemptor remains as good as it ever was. It has a huge amount of options, most of which are useless; for guns, the missile launcher is an auto-include, and then a pair of Twin Volkite Culverins beats everything else except the Conversion Beam Cannons at 48-72" (which will never come up, because you lack the tools to stay that far away from the enemy) against very heavy targets and Multimeltas against the same targets (including all the way up to 24" - they don't need melta range to beat the Volkites).  For melee, the basic DCW is a waste of your time - if it's not going to be a gun, it should be a chainfist, and you have no reason at all to take 2 melee weapons.  For the gun mounted in the chainfist, a combi-bolter is a waste of the CP this model cost you, so grab a heavy flamer, graviton blaster, or plasma blaster, depending on how much support you're giving the thing and how risky you want to get - the heavy flamer doesn't roll to hit, so the more hit support you have (Lord of Virulence, Tallyman, etc) the less you want it, while the plasma blaster is of dubious utility over the graviton blaster unless you can re-roll 1s to hit, since without overcharging the graviton blaster is much better. 
** So there's actually a lot of play right now with contemptors because they're {{W40Kkeyword|CORE}}. For example, if you take dual Volkite Culverins (and a missile launcher) on the contemptor for 16+(2 or 7) shots and put him by a Tallyman with the Tollkeeper relic, that Tallyman can make the contemptor hit on 2s while getting exploding 6s in a bubble. If you take 3 contemptors, assuming you use the krak profile in our example, that's 36 shots (32 Culverin, 4 Missile) at what amounts to BS2+, so 30 hits, and then 18 more hits (since the two buffs combined on the third contemptor mean that on average, every shot hits), for 48 landed hits - and with a re-roll 1s to hit aura applied, that goes up to 56 hits landed.  Unfortunately this costs 1 CP for each contemptor you take but hey, luckily for you, the Tallyman gives you cp every turn.
***If Mortarion shows up, full re-rolls to hit is best used on the contemptor ''not'' getting +1 from the Tallyman. The net effect of full re-rolls + exploding 6s is 40/36 accuracy.  The Tallyman's chosen target will have 42/36 accuracy, so the three Contemptors will have 35/36, 40/36, and 42/36 accuracy.  If you lose 2 Contemptors, the Tallyman and Mortarion won't usefully stack; fishing for 6s on a functionally BS2+ model by re-rolling 5 and below will get you total accuracy 42/36, the same as if you hadn't bothered.
***This also works with Multi-Meltas, of course.  They're just less efficient until you get to within 12" of the target.
***If you do this, make sure you take bubble wrap to protect your dakka dreads from getting easily charged.  A Blightspawn with the Revolting Stench-vats relic has an aura of removing ASF and inflicts ASL on one unit, so that plus Poxwalkers is very credible charge protection.  You'll also need Deathshrouds, most likely, to keep the Tallyman and Blightspawn (and probably Lord of Contagion or Daemon Prince) alive.
*'''Chaos Deredeo Dreadnought<sup>Forge World [Martial Legacy]</sup>''': Chaos finally got the Dorito Dreadnought! A lot of people have wanted this for a while and rightfully so, it kicks ass. Is a copy-paste of the marine version with the inclusion benefiting from Chaos marks and legion bonuses.
*'''Chaos Leviathan Dreadnought<sup>Forge World [Martial Legacy]</sup>''': Whatever was sacrificed in the name of Chaos to make these available... it was worth it. This super-dreadnought is a monster and priced very well for what it does. Since all FW Dreadnoughts received the 'Dreadnought' keyword this bad boy can be buffed by your legion traits - Emperor's Children always fights first comes to mind. As for valid weapon options, all are nasty and downright deadly in the right circumstances but are very expensive on an already expensive model. Often the Leviathan Dread is a brilliant distraction unit, but unless you have a foolproof way of getting it into combat quickly he's unlikely to really make his points back. Place him at the front of your army in the middle and use him to make your opponent sweat <s>whilst havocs and obliterators pop heavier targets</s>.
*'''[[Predator Tank|Chaos Deimos Predator]]:<sup>Legends Forge World</sup>''': This is the final anti-tank way for the Death Guard. For 140p and -1CP, the Deimos Predator allows you to destroy almost every 12W tank in one shooting phase, with the lascannon and Magna-Melta options. Some tales speak about that Deimos who shot down that emperor-golden-asslicker-Ares-birdo, but that's nothing I have seen yet...