As some of you know I've got a good 10,000pts of IWs and I've been planning on converting a few thousand points to make a plague marine army.

Background: The commander is a former member of the Deathshroud, Mortarion's personal bodyguard. After entering the eye and settling down Mortarion contracted this Deathshroud member to create a renegade army to do his extra dirty work without it being linked to him. Each Deathshroud member had their deaths faked long before the Heresy and no one knows their true names or backgrounds except Mortarion himself. This means the deathshroud member can move about and cause havok without his actions ever reflecting the Death Guard or Mortarion because no one knows of his real past, not the Inquisition or even Abbadon. The renegade force attacks anything Mortarion commands, on occasion even Death Guard forces that might not be doing as Mortarion wishes, one example would be their fight against Typhus. Most of their missions are just to attack things that better off Mortarion. They often spread diseases to the inhabitants of other demon worlds, and attack legions that Mortarion doesn't want to go after directly like more respected Black Legion armies.

The Noxius: On Mortarion's plague world the Deathshroud member came in contact with an especially nasty demonic virus and the demon that came with it. The demon called itself the Noxius and that is the name the Deathshroud member now uses. The virus is special, and different from most nurgle diseases in that it appears to cause mass mutations(normally associated with Tzeentch). The victim grows massive tumors, sores, scabs, and extra ligaments all over their bodies. The body can't withstand this and eventually dies. Since the deathshroud member is now the primary host of this demonic virus he has some degree of control over it. He can prevent it from getting out of control and turning its victims into outright spawn, and can even use it to heal wounds from small bullet holes to missing limbs. These gifts are not only conveyed onto himself but also his most loyal followers. One the other hand he can use the disease to slowly turn his enemies and captives into monsters of tumors and rotting flesh.

The Blight Reapers: Noxius was chosen instead of the other deathshroud members partly because of his unique disease. Everyone wants immortality, but the added benefits Noxius' disease granted on his followers makes joining him more appealing, and Mortarion new it would be easier for him to build a renegade army. Noxius named his new renegade army the Blight Reapers, and many of his first members were Death Guard members that followed him, but he has picked up new recruits from many sources. It is also speculated that Noxius has used his molded his mutation virus in some worthy humans to make them bigger and stronger... even space marines. Of the Blight Reapers only the highest ranking members, Noxius' ancient battle brothers, know the truth that Noxius is working directly for Mortarion. The rest believe that their tasks are only for Nurgle or to suit Noxius' personal endeavors. Their armor is dark grey, and sores and extra flesh grows from cracks and wounds in the armor. They also use strange spraying weapons that spray venomous acids like those found in blight grenades. They spray everything living they come in contact with to better spread the blight. The Blight Reapers also often have strange mutated monsters following them, each a former enemy that was taken over by the disease.

Deathshroud or Noxius: As a member of the Deathshroud, Noxius has one of the original manreapers. His special infection/possession also grants him a few abilities in addition. He can spray the most deadly of Nurgle's pure toxic acids out of sores on his body, and can of course control the disease to either gift his allies with regeneration abilities or turn his enemies into uncontrollable monsters.



Army Ideas: I can't decide for how to field Noxius himself. Here are my ideas in order of how I like them.


1. Field him as Typhus: He is really expensive this way, but I plan on having cheaper HQs to command the army in smaller battles(under 2500). The one other thing I don't like is that he doesn't have gift of chaos which is one of Noxius' primary abilities. Of course combat wise Typhus makes up for this by being able to use wind of chaos or nurgles rot(both could be Noxius spitting forth toxins) and then still use his Manreaper. I was also thinking that whenever someone is killed by the force weapon that could count as them being directly infected with the disease and Noxius using it to turn them into a monster. For this the psychic test would make sense and it could be assumed the transformation into a monster took time, hence why no spawn is placed on the field. The other thing I don't like is the rule about demon weapons now hurting the user 1/6 of the time. It was a whole lot less risky before. Finally Typhus is the only HQ option with FnP and it seems like a mandatory thing considering my commander's fluff.

2. Sorcerer: This way I could have gift of chaos, and wind of chaos or nurgles rot with a familiar to explain his powers. I would probably go with wind so I had one ranged ability instead of 2 primarily hth abilities and a force weapon. This also gets at why I don't like this idea as much. If gift of chaos is used, which will normally take place in close combat or right before an assault(due to the short range) the force weapon can not be used. It fits the fluff better, but I still want the army to be effective.

3. Chaos Lord w/ nurgle demon weapon: Close combat wise this would probably be the best option, but he lacks any of the things that define Noxius, so this is probably a no go.


Other things about the army.

Most of the troops will be plague marines not only because they should be but because the feel no pain explains the regeneration abilities quite well, but there will be some 'newer' members to the renegade force who won't be as infected yet. They'll be my havoks, some marines, bikers, ect. Some with at least have the mark of nurgle, most will not.

Blight Sprayer: These are the strange disease&acid spraying weapons talked about above. For rules purposes they are just flame throwers, but will be modeled as the blight sprayers.

Spawn: There will be a few spawn in the army. If they do anything that would be nice but mainly they are there for fluff and conversion potential. I won't be using the spawn models, instead I'll take models from different armies and just keep converting them and adding stuff till they represent spawn. The first model I'm going to do this with will be a bezerker, should be lots of fun.

Demon Prince: If I use one it would be as one of the diseases first victims, molded into the ultimate monster by Noxius. It would count as a demon prince but would clearly just be a gigantic spawn.

Thoughts and Ideas? I know that was a lot to read.