Plague Zombie

What do you get if you mix plastic bits from Cadians, Plaguebearers and warhammer fantasy Zombies, with a touch of greenstuff?  Well, the title of this post is kind of a give-away really, isn't it?  Yes, its a Plague Zombie.  And the first conversion of many that I'm hoping to accomplish.

Creating plague zombies is pretty easy to achieve for even the casual miniature convertor.  The bits are straight forward to go together and the best part is that even if it doesn't look quite right (or indeed: physically plausible), then you can get away with it: arms and legs at odd angles and crooked necks are all part and parcel of being a plague zombie, so roll with it!  I'm dredging the bits box for a few other finds to see what else I can incorporate.  I was thinking that some fantasy ghouls might be a nice touch, but also Catachans, the old Chaos Mutation sprue, and even an odd Orky arm or armour might not go too much amiss to be honest. Heck, why should humans have all the fun: I'm sure Grandpa Nurgle would be only too happy to count Ork plague zombies amongst his flock.

This particular chap features the legs and chainsword arm of a Cadian sergeant, coupled with a zombie torso and right arm (notice the grenades being carried in the zombie arm as well), a zombie head inside a cracked Cadian helmet, a utility belt at the rear (just above the buttocks) and a cute nurgling tugging at the zombie's innards to pull him along in the right direction a bit faster!  I like the dynamism of this conversion, the humour of the nurgling, coupled with the menace of the chainsword and the un-realized potential of the grenades: does the zombie have enough brains left to pull the pins on them?  Or will the nurgling do the job itself eventually?

CSM in 6th Review: Typhus

Typhus the traveller is host to the Destroyer Hive, having been worshipping Nurgle long before Mortarion. Indeed, in some ways, Mortarion's instruction to Typhus to cease using psychic powers was probably part of the reason Typhus first heard Great Nurgle's voice.  

In the game, I've always struggled to comprehend how and where Typhus should fit in.  In previous editions, I didn't use him outside Apocalypse due to his high points value. In 6th, he still has a very high points value, but has a couple of boons that weren't there before.

Firstly his destroyer hive has had a major boost.  Once per game he can place a big pie plate over himself an hit everything (friend and foe) for S4, AP2.  There's an obvious combination with Epidemius in here!

Secondly, there's the ability to morph chaos cultists in to plague zombies.  Although there is presently some controversy about the unit size of plague zombies (personally, I think the wording allows big plague zombie squads), there is still a lot of scope.  FNP, Fearless, and SnP means cheap objective holding.  Hide them behind an Aegis defence line and there's suddenly a tough squad who'll hang around a while.  The only pity is that they don't turn other combatants in to further plague zombies like Apocalypse does.  One additional thought is whether Nurgle marked cultists might actually be better (particularly if we're going down the Epidemius allied route!).

Other than that, Typhus is a close combat exponent.  He's a terminator with level 2 psyker abilities (all selected from Nurgle powers alone).  The obvious thing to do then, is to join him with other terminators (Nurgle marked or otherwise) and deepstrike them on to the battlefield, or roll them up in a land raider.  Typhus wants to make close combat where his S6 AP2 daemon-force weapon attacks will pay off gloriously.  But then, he has the same issues as Abaddon: he doesn't really want to become a chaos spawn, and a daemon prince is probably only fractionally better / worse (depending on what statistics or abilities one considers).  And his warlord trait (Lord of Terror) isn't going to be much use really.

So, what once was a character for Apocalypse or devoted Nurgle fans only, now has some interesting possibilities that will resonate in a number of army lists.  Could a working plague zombie army be built using Typhus?  Probably yes: hundreds of cheap troops, with some support and hard hitters spent on the spare points could work very well.

Typhus and Zombie Plague Armies from the New Chaos Codex

In Apocalypse, Typhus and friends had a formation that consisted of Plague Zombies.  This has now been translated to the new Chaos Space Marine codex in a specific format.

With Typhus, the chaos cultists can be converted in to plague zombies.  This has advantages: fearless and feel no pain being chief among them.  That said, there are disadvantages: slow and purposeful and the inability to take optional upgrades that would usually be open to regular cultists.

One of the problems that has already been flagged with the wording of Typhus' rules concerns what counts as "upgrades".  Specifically, whether increasing the number of zombies in a unit counts as an optional upgrade.  I don't see that this counts as an option.  An option is usually taken as being one of the listed equipment swaps (and so forth).  Hence, huge blobs of plague zombies seem feasible!

For under 1000 points, one can now form the core of an army from Typhus and hundreds (well, perhaps up to 200 and something anyway) plague zombies.  This is quite incredible really!  Even if the plague zombies are weak, the feel no pain rule will keep many alive for long enough to get in to close combat to cause headaches, and to go to ground on top of a valuable objective.  Not too many armies have the firepower to take down more than one hundred models ... and even in close combat, death star units can only take out up to tens of models in close combat per turn.  Take thunder hammer terminators: a squad of 5, at worst, would take out 10 per turn.  Against several tens of zombies, they're going to be locked up, tarpitted and whittled to death eventually (yes: even terminators roll 1's for saves, despite recent experiences!).

Depending on points limits, this leaves room for several fast attack, heavy support and elites choices (perhaps alongside some plaguemarines, or Nurgle daemon allies as well?).  Building such an army feels appealing to me -- I've not done such a "horde" army in a while.  And making it competitive seems like a neat challenge -- so I'll try to post a speculative army list once the codex is actually released.  Is this flavour of plague zombie army speaking volumes to other people as well?  Or is it simply my Nurglesque mind that has been corrupted?!